Isaiah Berlin's Pluralist Thought and Liberalism

:A Re-Reading and Contrast With John Rawls

A Doctoral Dissertation By Avery Plaw Department of Political Science McGill University, Montreal November 5, 2001 A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements of the degree ofPh.D. Avery Plaw 2001

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Abstract:

lsaiah Berlin's Pluralist Thought and Liberalism :A Re-Reading and Contrast with John Rawls

This dissertation argues that Isaiah Berlin and John Rawls can be seen as seminal contributors to two quite distinct revivals of political theory in the latter half of the twentieth century. It suggests that coming to grips with the different underlying character of these revivals and writers is important to understanding political theory and liberalism today. However, whil the importance Berlin's ofBerlin's work is increasingly recognized, there remain puzzling controversies concerning its overall character and import and in particular concerning its relationship to the dominant forms of American political thought, and Rawls' work in particular. This dissertation offers a novel interpretation ofBerlin's political thought and liberalism, and a preliminary exploration of its relationship with Rawls' political thought. The reading of Berlin develops the following principal themes: (1.) Berlin was a moderate but consistent historicist primarily concemed with the interpretive selfunderstanding ofhis own form oflife; (2.) Berlin was a strong but distinctive pluralist who argued for a limited but open-ended range of recognizable and rivalrous ultimate values and for an agitated equilibrium of these values in public life; (3.) Berlin focused the bulk of his critical energy on defending an interrially pluralistic range of traditionally liberal values within this agitated equilibrium, with an emphasis on liberty and pluralism. He nonetheless recognized that there were other equally ultimate values, not distinctively liberal, which were legitimate and deserving of consideration and even defense. Berlin' s essential insight is into the contemporary rivalry of equally ultimate values revealed by the historicist exercise of the sympathetic imagination. This interpretation ofBerlin's thought suggests sorne deep points of dispute with Rawls' Political Liberalism, in particular over the regulative role ofRawls' political conception ofjustice in public reason. This dissertation argues that, when explored, these points of disagreement reveal two very different approaches to contemporary political thought, Berlin's grounded in an embrace of strong moral and political pluralism as the basis of political theory, and Rawls' grounded in an effort to tame such "simple" pluralism through the elaboration of a consensual normative framework of public life.

Rsum abstractif:

La pense pluraliste d'Isaiah Berlin et son libralisme :une relecture et contraste avec John Rawls

Cette dissertation soutient que Isaiah Berlin et John Rawls peuvent tous deux tre envisags comme les principaux artisans de deux distincts renouveaux de la pense politique de la seconde moiti du vingtime sicle. Elle suggre aussi que venir aux prises avec la nature sous-jacente de ces renouveaux et de ces auteurs est essentiel toute comprhension du libralisme et de la philosophie politique contemporaine. Cependant, bien que l'importance de l'apport de Berlin soit de plus en plus reconnue, des questions concernant la nature de cet apport et plus particulirement son rapport avec les courants dominants de la pense politique amricaine, plus prcisment celle de Rawls, demeurent sans rponses et peuvent laisser perplexes. Cette dissertation offre une interprtation novatrice de la pense de Berlin et du libralisme ainsi qu'une exploration prliminaire de son rapport avec la pense politique de Rawls. Dans son interprtation de la pense de Berlin, l'auteur dveloppe les thmes suivants: (1) Berlin tait un historicien modr mais cohrent qui tait proccup, en premier lieu, par une comprhension interprtative de son propre mode de vie; (2) Berlin tait un pluraliste ferme mais distingu qui croyait en l'existence d'un nombre limit mais variable de valeurs finales reconnues et rivales et en un quilibre en mouvement de ces valeurs au sein de la vie publique; (3) Berlin concentrait l'essentiel de son nergie critique la sauvegarde des valeurs librales comptitionnant au sein de cet quilibre, en mettant l'emphase sur la libert et le pluralisme. Nanmoins, ce dernier reconnaissait qu'il pourrait y avoir d'autres valeurs d'un mme niveau, qui ne seraient pas ncessairement librales mais tout aussi lgitimes et mritantes de considration et de protection. La contribution essentielle de Berlin est la rvlation de la rivalit de ces valeurs gales par l'exercice historique de l'imagination compatissante. Cette interprtation de Berlin suggre l'existence de profonds conflits avec l'ouvrage Political Liberalism de Rawls, plus prcisment propos du rle rgulateur de la conception politique de la justice au sein de la raison publique. L'auteur propose que, lorsqu'explors, ces aspects litigieux rvlent deux approches trs diffrentes de la pense politique: celle de Berlin, enracine dans une pleine adhsion aux principes simples du pluralisme moral et politique comme fondation de la pense politique et celle

de Rawls, enracine dans un effort de domestiquer et limiter ce pluralisme par l'laboration d'une structure normative consensuelle de vie publique.

Acknowledgments: 1 would like to express profound gratitude to my thesis supervisor, Alan Patten, for his boundless patience, support and encouragement. 1 would further like to express my thanks to my department and university, who have given me the opportunity to undertake this research and who have persistently supported me in it. Special thanks are also due to my parents, without whom 1 would never have been able to complete this project, and to Jane Danek, especially for her care, support and advice, not to mention her editing skills.

For Gilbert, Cathy, and Jane, who did not lose hope.

Isaiah Berlin's Pluralist Thought and Liberalism Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Li 1.ii 1.iii 1.iv 1.v 1.vi 1.vii 1.viii 1.ix 1.x 1.xi Chapter 2: 2.i 2.ii 2.iii 2.iv 2.v 2.vi 2.vii 2.viii Chapter 3: 3.i 3.ii 3.iii 3.iv 3.v 3.vi

Berlin, Rawls and the Revival of Political Theory The Premature Death of Political Theory A Contested Relationship Why Berlin? Methodological Overview An Introduction to Political Thought Berlin's Moderate But Consistent Historicism Berlin's Strong Pluralism Berlin' s Pluralist Liberalism Berlin and Rawls The Centre of Berlin StructuralOverview Two Readings of Berlin An Approach to the Readings of Berlin Liberal Readings of Berlin Berlin as a Strong Liberal Berlin as a Weak Liberal Pluralist Readings of Berlin Berlin as a Strong Pluralist Berlin as a Relativist Conclusion

1 1 5 9 15 21 26 30 33 34 36 38 46 46 52 53 63 71 72 79 84 96 96 102 108 110 113 118 130 138 149 149 152 171 190

Berlin's Moderate Historicism Clashing Natures Historicism Berlin's Moderate but Consistent Historicism Sympathetic Imagination and Understanding Moderate and Metaphysical Historicism Universal Values, Objective Ends And Common Human Nature 3.vii Berlin's Philosophical and Po1itical Thought 3.viii Conclusion Berlin's Strong Pluralism and Liberty Disputed Intentions Berlin's Strong Pluralism Liberty as an Ultimate Value Conclusion

Chapter 4: 4.i 4.ii 4.iii 4.iv

Table of Contents (Continued)

Chapter 5: 5.i 5.ii 5.iii 5.iv 5.v 5.vi 5.vii Chapter 6: 6.i 6.ii 6.iii 6.iv Chapter 7: 7.i 7.ii 7.iii

Human Nature and the Unstable Political Equilibrium The Problems of Integration and Defense The Content of Historicized Human Nature Supporting the Precarious Equi1ibrium The Monist Rejoinder The Hermeneutic Critique The Charge of Relativism Conclusion Pluralist Liberalism and Political Liberalism Problems of Pluralism and Liberalism Berlin's Pluralist Liberalism Two Concepts of Liberalism: Berlin and Rawls Conclusion Conclusion: The Politics ofPluralism Two Basic Problems Berlin Redux Two Traditions: Arbitration- and consensusBased Thought and Liberalism

201 201 204 211 225 234 240 244 253 253 256 278 298 309 309 310 318 325

Bibliography

Note: The abbreviation [ia] has been used throughout the text to indicate where italics have been added.

I can't possibly overstate the importance of good research. Everyone goes through life dropping crumbs. If you can recognize the crumbs, you can trace a path ail the way back from yom death certificate to the dinner and a movie that resulted in you in the first place. But research is an art, not a science, because anyone who knows what they are doing can find the crumbs - the 'wheres' and 'whats' and 'whos.' The art is in the 'whys'; the ability to read between the crumbs - not to mix metaphors. For every event there is a cause and effect, for every action a motive, and for every motive a passion. The art of research is the ability to look at the crumbs and see the passion.
The Zero EfJect, Written and Directed by Jake Kasden, Produced by Janet Yong and Lisa Hensen, Castle Rock Entertainment, 1997.

It seems to me, first, that certain among the romantics cut the deepest of aIl the roots of the c1assical outlook - namely the belief that values, the answers to questions of action and choice, could be discovered at aIl - and maintained that there were no answers to sorne of these questions, either subjective or objective, either empirical or a priori. Secondly, there was for them no guarantee that values did not, in principle, conflict with one another, or, ifthey did, that there was a way out; and they held, like MachiaveIli, that to deny this was a form of self-deception, nave, or shaIlow, pathetic and always disastrous. Thirdly, my thesis is that by their positive doctrine the romantics introduced a new set of values, not reconcilable with the old, and that most Europeans are today the heirs of two opposing traditions. We accept both outlooks, and shift from one foot to the other in a fashion that we cannot avoid if we are honest with ourselves, but which is not inteIlectually coherent. To trace this momentous shift in outlook could be a life's work. Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution," in The Sense ofReality, p. 175
"The basic art of original creation as opposed to discovery and analysis - that's a romantic conception. This contradicts the philosophy - the philosophia perennis - of objective values, however discovered, which reigned from Plato until the modern positivists, throughout Western history with no break. This great structure was not overthrown, but it was cracked, as it were, by the romantics. As for us, we inherit both these traditions, objective discovery and subjective creation, and oscillate between them, and try vainly to combine them, or ignore their incompatibility. Isaiah Berlin in Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.),Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 159 [Man is... ] incapable of self-completion, and therefore never wholly predictable; a fallible, a complex combination of opposites, sorne reconcilable, others incapable of being resolved and harmonized; unable to cease from his search for truth, happiness, novelty, freedom, but with no guarantee, theological or logical or scientific, ofbeing able to attain them: a free, imperfect being capable of determining his own destiny in circumstances favorable to the development of his reason and his gifts. Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 205.

The conflict of the rival explanations (or models) of social and individuallife had, by the late Eighteenth century, grown to be a scandaI. Is there still such a subject as political theory? This query, put with suspicious frequency in English-speaking countries, questions the very credentials of the subject: it suggests that political philosophy, whatever it may have been in the past, is today dead or dying. - Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" 1

Chapter 1: Berlin, Rawls and the Revival ofPolitical Theory 1.i The Premature Death of Political Theory
In the first half of the twentieth century, political theory or philosophy led a shadowy existence, and many eminent thinkers were led to doubt its very existence as a going scholarly concern. 2 Among other concerns raised by skeptics was the absence of any "commanding work" in the field, combined with a sense that the whole endeavor was hopelessly ideological or partisan, and so burdened with the baggage of pluralism, of diverse and irreconcilable conceptions, orientations, and methods, so as to be paralyzed. 3 Marxists derived Marxist conclusions from Marxist foundations, while liberals distilled liberal insights from liberal foundations, and conservatives reaffirmed established customs on the basis oftheir own perspectives, and it did not seem that they had very much constructive to say to one another. Each position seemed enclosed in its own sphere of reference. Since the foundations differed as sharply as the conclusions, there did not seem to be a definitive basis or overarching criterion for comparison. Political theory seemed more and more a field driven by rhetorical or aesthetic contrasts rather than by rational argument and interaction. It was widely felt therefore that political theory ought, if it was to be pursued at all, to be subjected to the rigorous standards of measurement and verification that were deemed to be characteristic of the natural sciences;4 it was to be reduced, if retained at aIl, to an adjunct of a quantitative discipline, integrating testable propositions into a general scientific framework - in Isaiah
Berlin's words, "political science [was] to be converted into an applied science."s

In the second half of the century, however, this general skepticism about political theory as an independent inquiry seemed to lapse into abeyance; Anglo-American scholarship boasted at least two major revivaIs ofpolitical theory, one primarily British, beginning in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and the other primarily American, beginning

in the early 1970s. Both revivaIs were punctuated by a number of major texts that were widely recognized as 'commanding works,' most notably on the American side John Rawls' imposing A Theory ofJustice, and more recently the work of a range of scholars including Ronald Dworkin, Bruce Ackerman, and Richard Rorty. The English side also arguably boasted a number of seminal texts, including Isaiah Berlin's Four Essays on Liberty and a range of important contributions in moral and political thought from Bernard Williams, Stuart Hampshire, Gerald Cohen, Joseph Raz, C.B. Macpherson, Steven Lukes, John Gray and others. Both revivaIs have today grown into dynamic and robust traditions. In Ronald Dworkin's words, in his own version of "Two Concepts of Liberty," That gloomy picture [ofpolitical philosophy] is unrecognizable now. Political philosophy thrives as a mature industry; it dominates many distinguished philosophy departments and attracts a large share of the best graduate students everywhere. Berlins' lecture "Two Concepts of Liberty," played an important and 6 distinctive role in this renaissance. In light ofthese renewals, political theory now thrives in forms perceptibly akin to traditional political philosophy, and few doubt its claim to be a legitimate discipline, although equally few seem to agree on its precise object domain, methods, or conclusions. Political theory, it seems, exists, but it is not entirely clear what it consists in - post-structuralists propose one agenda and set of findings, quantitative political scientists another, neo-conservatives a third, neo-Marxists a fourth, neo-classicists a fifth, and so on. Even the most widely-employed concepts seem, on inspection, to inspire deep controversy. The old spectre of paralyzing diversity has reappeared, and now perhaps in an even more virulent form, for it seems to be combined, as Alasdair MacIntyre has forcefully argued, with a growing doubt about the universality and stability of even our most basic moral and politicallanguage, 7 with a sense of disintegrating foundations, with what Berlin described as the triumph of irrationalism and the collapse of public philosophy. 8 Political theory has risen from the dead, but it has not thereby stilled the full range of doubts undid it in the first place. There are commanding works, perhaps, but there is no decisive answer to the corrosive problem of ideological and methodological, even conceptual, pluralism. Political theory seems still to suffer from the absence of

authoritative methods, techniques and conclusions which had undermined its status as a serious independent discipline in the first place. The two distinct revivaIs of political thought exhibited, 1 will argue, distinct strategies for grappling with these haunting doubts. The American thinkers, tended to plumb for sorne deep foundation, sorne shared underlying intuitions adequate to establish at least a basic regulative framework for public consideration of fundamental political questions. The English thinkers, 1 will argue, embraced basic, irreducible diversity, and explored means for continuing to argue, understand and judge in spite of the difficulties entailed by strong pluralism. The American revival has received the lion's share of attention in post-war Anglo-American scholarship, and one of the main objectives of this dissertation will be to calI attention to the underlying character of the English revival. Both recent revivaIs ofpolitical theory, 1think, drew inspiration from an initiator of sorts, a thinker whose work helped to precipitate a renewal of interest, namely, Isaiah Berlin in the British case, and John Rawls in the American. Of course, both revivaIs were and remain complex, evolving, mutually influential affairs, encompassing diverse perspectives, and no full or comprehensive sense ofthese movements can be gleaned through an exclusive consideration of these two thinkers alone. The renewals of interest in political theory that Berlin and Rawls helped to catalyze extend far beyond the scope oftheir own work and interests. Nonetheless, 1think that it is at least plausible to say that both Berlin and Rawls were, in their own ways, unusually influential. If we can allow these influences, then we have a reason to take an interest in them, and particularly in their relationship. Both men were self-proclaimed politicalliberals, both were deeply influenced, for example, by Immanuel Kant; nonetheless, 1will argue that they elaborated profoundly different visions of what doing political theory involves, and, 1 think, ultimately of what the concept of politicalliberalism entails. The relationship of these two thinkers has been frequently alluded to, both directly and indirectly, as we will
soon sce, but it has yet to be explored in any detai1.

If my claim concerning the seminal roles of Berlin and Rawls in the revival of political theory in the latter half of the twentieth century is, for the sake of argument, provisionally accepted, it suggests that while a sustained focus on Berlin and Rawls may not reveal the entire picture, it should well help to illuminate sorne of the key points of

dispute and division in contemporary Anglo-American political thought. It may, further, offer sorne insight into the contemporary fragmented state of political theory as a discipline, and, perhaps most importantly, the meaning and entailments of political liberalism. My initial claim of the importance of Berlin and Rawls to contemporary political thought can only ultimately be demonstrated by showing that such a study can in fact produce such illuminating insights. We may sayat least, however, that there is a plausible rationale for investigating a little further. The aspiration ofthis dissertation is therefore twofold: it attempts first to clarify an essential drive of the English revival of political thought through a careful re-reading of the work of Isaiah Berlin, and second, with that conception firmly in hand, to briefly explore sorne essential points of comparison and contrast between Berlin and of Rawls. The next section of this introduction briefly explores how the relation between the two thinkers is viewed by their major interpreters. It attempts to establish that there is an issue of real interest here which, while it has not infrequently been touched upon, has not yet been investigated in any detail. In particular, 1 want to draw attention to the radically different accounts of the Rawls-Berlin relationship offered by partisans and interpreters of Rawls on the one hand, and those of Berlin on the other. Before turning to the differing perceptions of the relationship between political theory according to Rawls and Berlin, however, 1want to introduce a concept, important to both thinkers and associated revivaIs, through which they can and will be explored, compared and contrasted - that is, the concept of politicalliberalism. This concept, and the differing ways it has been used and interpreted, represents a flagship issue of AngloAmerican political thought. Again, as Rawls' concept of politicalliberalism is explicitly treated in his work at considerable length, and has been the focus of a great deal of recent discussion, and aIl in aIl will be far more familiar to most readers, the vast proportion of the discussion here will focus on distilling what 1take to be Berlin's liberalism. Both
Rawls and Berlin's concepts of liberalism reflect and inform the revivais of political

thought with which they are associated, and will provide powerful tools for coming to grips with the relationship between these two traditions. In Rawls' thought, and in American discourse more generally, politicalliberalism has been either a source or locus of political consensus. It is argued that we, the denizens

of the contemporary West, are, in the main, 'politicalliberals' in sorne very general sense - in Rorty's use, for example, liberalism, at least in the first instance, indicates simply that we are "heirs of the Enlightenment," which seems difficult to dispute, as far as it goes. 9 1 will argue that for Berlin, by contrast, politicalliberalism marks a point of pluralistic contestation and on-going controversy. For Berlin, politicalliberalism, as it is elaborated or unpacked beyond the most basic sense of respecting negative liberty as an ultimate value, seems almost bottomlessly controversial. There are many liberalisms. Berlin's claim here seem plausible. For Rawls, for example, politicalliberalism is first and foremost political justice, \0 while for Ronald Dworkin it is an overriding principle of equality, Il for Richard Rorty, it is an ironie position, devoted primarily to personal poetic self-re-creation,12 whereas for Berlin it is deeply connected with the recognition and accommodation of strong moral and political pluralism. If we look beyond contemporary discourse, the structure and substance ofpoliticalliberalism appears even more diverse. For utilitarians, a liberal position is devoted to maximizing utility on various schemas (James or J.S.Mill), while for others it is a telic conception embodying the supremacy of various human goods (autonomy, rationalism, tolerance, liberty, civic humanism, selfmastery). Yet, ifwe, their audience, are in the main politicalliberals, then surely we are entitled to demand what does this mean, to be a politicalliberal, and what does it entail, and how does one know that this is so, and why should 1 believe this instead of something else? My suggestion is that we take these questions back to the two revivaIs which have led us to this awkward pass, and explore how these different conceptions of political thought and politicalliberalism confronted these haunting difficulties which seemed at one time to have hounded political theory into a disreputable grave. Then perhaps we will be better equipped to frame our own ideas of the nature of political theory and the meaning of politicalliberalism.
l.ii A Contcsted Relationship

The laws of nature sadly preclude any actual encounter between these two influential thinkers; Berlin passed away on November 5, 1997; Rawls has retired. 1therefore propose to formulate the best and most persuasive readings of Berlin that 1 can, and to

use these as a jumping off point for constructing a preliminary comparison with Rawls, focusing in particular on their different concepts of political thought and liberalism. The two men themselves came close to a direct encounter in 1958, as Michael Ignatieff records: Morton White invited Berlin in 1958 to conduct a seminar on liberalism at Harvard with John Rawls and, had he accepted, Berlin might have found himself pressed to take his arguments further. He did not accept White's invitation, and the consequences of a sustained encounter between Rawls and Berlin remain in the domain of might have been. When the American revival of liberal theory came in the 1970s, with the publication of Rawls' A Theory ofJustice, it took a Rawlsian rather than a Berlinian form. The feature that distinguished Berlin from Rawls was his emphasis on the ultimate incompatibility of values, and hence the 13 tragic quality of liberal choice.
It is certainly my hope that this project will contribute to rectifying the misfortune ofthis

missed opportunity. 1 suspect that Ignatieff is well-justified in suggesting that such an encounter might have influenced the form that the American revival of political thought took. Indeed, both the idea that such an encounter might yet re-shape the dominant form that American political thought has taken, and the idea that an encounter with Rawls might have deepened and enriched Berlin's thought, as Ignatieff suggests, are compelling reasons to pursue this discussion. When Ignatiefflater adds, however, that what is missing or inchoate in Berlin but would likely have been forced on him in a dialogue with Rawls is a detailed "political doctrine," 14 a clear and comprehensive articulation of his politicalliberalism, a definitive statement of "how much social justice was compatible with liberty, indeed how much social justice was required,,,15 then 1 must disagree. 1 think and will argue, rather, that the direction in which a confrontation with Rawls pushes Berlin is towards a more explicit repudiation of the notion that philosophy can or should culminate in any single, final, authoritative answer to such abstract questions. Philosophy should rather concentrate on the real material of our lives, on illuminating our particular commitments, concepts and values, our actual questions, problems and sometimes irresolvable conflicts, rather than on propounding grand, generallaws and comprehensive theoretical structures. Interestingly, each of the major writers on Berlin's political thought have emphasized the deep, constitutive clash of perspectives between Berlin and Rawls,

whereas Rawls and his defenders have treated Berlin, when they have treated him at aIl, as a sympathetic theoretical compatriot. Michael Ignatieff has already been heard on the important but inadequately explored relationship between Berlin and Rawls. C.J. Galipeau concurs in his Isaiah Berlin's Liberalism: Even though he defends liberal principles, he is critical of the rationalist and Enlightenment ideals and methods which guide virtually allliberai thought .... such as that promoted by Rawls .... 16 the experience of incommensurability in morallife [as it appears in Berlin] restricts in many non-trivial ways the applicability of the main modern theories of morality, utilitarianism and Kantianism, including John Rawls' theory ofjustice. 17 Indeed, he suggests that Rawls could be accused of embracing Berlin's philosophical nemesis - monism. 18 John Gray drives Galipeau's point home even more forcefully. He points to further critical points of conf1ict between Berlin and Rawls: "For Berlin, certainly, value-pluralism is not restricted to conceptions of the good. It goes ail the way
down, right down into principles ofjustice and rights.,,19 [ia]

... in John Rawls, late as much as early, they [i.e., 'liberal principles'] are adopted as rational terms of cooperation among persons having no comprehensive conception of the good in common. In Berlin's agonistic liberalism, by contrast, the value of freedom derives from the limits of rational choice.2 The idea that there is a structure of compossible rights, or a system of dovetailing side-constraints, or a set of basic liberties, as these ideas are developed in other recent liberal thinkers in a Kantian tradition, such as Steiner, Nozick, and Rawls, . . IS reJecte dby Berl' 21 m. For this reason, he does not accept the unconditional priority of liberty over other political values that is affirmed in the Kantian liberalism of John Rawls, insisting instead that tradeoffs between liberty and other values are often legitimate and indeed unavoidable. Berlin's view [is] that there can be no principle which tells us how to make tradeoffs .... 22 For Ignatieff, Galipeau and particularly Gray, Berlin appears as deeply critical of the
main tradition of American thought in general and Rawls in particular.

Rawls sparse references to Berlin, however, suggest that he sees Berlin's views are wholly compatible, and even supportive, ofhis own. 23 He, moreover, argues that reasonable pluralists in general have reason to endorse normative consensus, although he does not specifically name Berlin at this point. Defenders of Rawls' theory, such as Larry
7

Krasnoff, have explicitly argued that p1ura1ists, and Berlin in particu1ar, can, and indeed must, endorse Raw1s' political theory: The non-Raw1sian p1ura1ist - whom we might call a rational p1ura1ist [later in this same note Krasnoff exp1icit1y categorizes Berlin under this classification] understands libera1 toleration as va1uab1e because it conduces to our many ends. She reasons that since we all have a great many ends, we need a 1ibera1 regime to protect all these possible sources of value. On this view, given the truth of pluralism and the existence of the diversity ofhuman ends, we are rationally committed to reasonable politica1 justification [and consequently endorse overlapping consensus and embrace Rawls' political1iberalism].24 Krasnoff argues that rational pluralism leads to a demand for tolerance which 1eads in turn to a demand for politicalliberalism and an embrace of the need for reasonab1e political justification. The demand for reasonab1e politica1 justification gives Berlin a compelling reason to join in Raw1s' overlapping consensus. Out of this disagreement two overriding questions emerge: first, how can we best understand the form, content, and intention of Berlin's work? Second, is Berlin primarily a comrade or a critic of Rawls? The first question obviously establishes the basis for answering the second, and it is the first question with which 1 will be primarily concerned in this study. 1 will briefly introduce my reading of Berlin 1ater in this chapter, in section Lv., and will elaborate this brief sketch in chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6; in the closing section of the chapter 61 will return to the matter of Berlin's relation to Raw1s. The results ofthis inquiry are, 1 think, surprising. Not on1y does Berlin turn out to offer a basis for a powerful critique of Rawls, which may not be wholly surprising, but, more strikingly, his views can, as it turns out, be turned against his own major interpreters, and the kinds of positions that they have tried to attribute to him. In essence, John Gray is righter than he knows when he writes that Berlin's thought is "far more subversive of received intellectual tradition in philosophy than is commonly perceived. ,,25 He is indeed subversive, and sometimes in ways with seem to escape and ultimately confound even Gray. In essence, while various components of Berlin's thought have been critically understood and appreciated, and their influence recognized, 1 do not think an adequate consolidation of these points, a convincing overall picture of Berlin' s thought, has yet emerged. Once framed, such a picture proves deeply revealing not on1y

in relation to the particular influential components of Berlin's thought, but also in terms of the character of the English revival ofpolitical thought in general, and, by contrast with it, of the American revival as well.

l.iii Why Berlin?

My purpose in this dissertation then is not to leap immediately into an imaginary BerlinRawls debate, but only to take a not insignificant step towards that debate by distilling the best, most compelling, reading of Berlin and to move towards a preliminary critique of Rawls; but why, one might ask, start with Berlin? Again, 1think any number of adequate reasons might be offered because Berlin is the earlier writer (or because the

British revival of political theory preceded the American), because Berlin might in sorne way have helped to frame the context of Rawls' emergence, because for aIl Berlin's eminence and reputation he is still vastly less known and discussed than Rawls, because Berlin's approach is relatively consistent in comparison with the complex shift in Rawls' thought between A Theory ofJustice and Political Liberalism, because Berlin is the less overtly systematic thinker and therefore requires more preliminary reconstruction, perhaps because Berlin is more pervasively misunderstood (at least in my estimation), and other similar reasons. The really decisive motivation is, however, as usual (at least for me), the personal one: 1 want to write this because 1 am impressed with Berlin's writing and because 1 do not think that its full scope and power have been captured by either his proponents or his detractors, nor has the important critique of Rawls and the whole structure of contemporary American political thought been given adequate expression. Even Berlin's most rigorous interpreters have commonly acknowledged the difficulty of doing justice to the full scope of his oeuvre, and have generally concentrated primarily on sorne specifie sub-set of his published works as the core through which the rest of his output should be read. 1think a more faithful and persuasive reading can be gleaned from a more continuous and integrated treatment of his work. Berlin himself
allowed that "Although 1 arn a pluralist, there is, Tsuppose, sorne unity in my thought.

My ideas are, for the most part, related to each other. ,,26 The task of bringing out these underlying relations is the real challenge of reading Berlin, and one which 1think has not yet been satisfactorily discharged.

All of this may no doubt, however, be said in one form or another about a number of different political thinkers, including, perhaps, Rawls - 1 think that it may even be said accurately of Rawls that there are specifically subversive elements ofhis work which have yet to be very fully appreciated, such as the wider ramifications of his political concept of the self as composed of two distinct moral powers, or the implications of his strategie retreat from the notion of moral desert. The consideration is still not specifie enough to lead to Berlin with any conviction. Let me brief1y sketch three considerations which 1think help to further explain the interest in reconsidering Berlin's work at this time: (first,) Berlin's highly distinctive model of political thought marries strong politicalliberalism and strong political pluralism, and thus challenges not only the dominant contemporary political theories in the West, but also the framework ofprominent debates, whether liberal-communitarian or liberal-pluralist. (Second,) Berlin's thought carries much of the strength of communitarian and pluralist critiques of deontological or universalliberalism without falling into the prominent difficulties which have undermined such critiques. 27 1will argue that Berlin's model of politicalliberalism is not conceived as a universal truth or as the ultimate culmination of a vast historical development, but as a particular, historical model, modest and tentative in its claims (if vital in its discourse), and based on an intemally pluralistic range of basic values (ends, ideals, concepts), open to an extensive array of basic constructions, and open to change, and even radical transformation. (Finally,) this conception challenges not only the content, but also the form of the mainstream approach to political theory. It offers a highly original vision of what political thought is, and how it can be usefully pursued. In essence, for Berlin, political theory is concemed with the types of problems that do not carry the means of their own solution - that is, it is concemed with the types of questions and problems for which there are no clear and unambiguous criteria, or techniques or foundations ofjudgment,
but for which these have to be continual1y worked out (and negotiated) in reference to

particular problems. In essence, for Berlin the very cognitive gaps and anomalies that were believed to have infected political theory with the 'sickness unto death,' in the first half of the century, become its very essence and the source of its continuing relevance.

\0

It may be helpful at this point to pause and explain in a little more detail what l
mean by these three points concerning Berlin's contemporary relevance. This explanation, however, requires a brief digression into recent developments in AngloAmerican political thought. Today there is a very noticeable revival of interest in Berlin's political thought. He seems, at least posthumously, to have inspired a school, a movement, a common agenda shared by a range of themselves influential writers. In a recent issue of the American Political Science Review William Galston credits Berlin with having inspired, or at least catalyzed, a "value pluralist" movement which is becoming increasingly influential in contemporary political and philosophical discourse and whose "leading contributors include John Gray, Stuart Hampshire, John Kekes, Charles Larmore, Steven Lukes, Thomas Nagel, Martha Nussbaum, Joseph Raz, Michael Stocker, Charles Taylor and Bernard Williams.,,28 This seems to me a remarkable group of writers. The list, however, is hardly comprehensive; in point of fact, it bare1y 29 scratches the surface. The growing prominence of the value pluralist movement reflects a shift of focus in Anglo-American political thought in the last several years. In the 1980s and the early 1990s, Anglo-American political thought was marked by the widely discussed liberalcommunitarian debate, a contest which seemed to have wide and important ramifications both for political thought and other areas of study. Communitarians formulated telling critiques ofthe foundations of the dominant forms ofliberal theory, particularly in American discourse. Liberalism was charged with relying on a false ontology, a "defective conception of the self,,,3o and on implausible universalist epistemologies claiming, for example, knowledge of "universal and invariant principles ofjustice.,,31 In essence, liberal foundations were accused of being drastically abstract, and of failing to correspond with actual experience of morallife and commitments as we actually know and experience them, as well as of neglecting values deemed to be essential to a good life, such as community, patriotism, group rights, and the environment. 32 LiberaIs, for their part, pressed the point that communitarians generally held political positions which were, for all intents and purposes, largely liberal in practice, regardless ofhow they tried to rationalize (or justify) them. Moreover, liberalism could do far more to accommodate communitarian values like the environment and the

Il

community, and suffered less ofa deficiency ofpatriotism, than communitarians allowed. Most importantly, liberals pressed the notion that liberal values can be, indeed effectively are, the dominant values of our community. They are not then a denial but an affirmation of our community - a liberal community.33 This liberal-response produced difficulties for communitarians, for it shifted attention away from their potent ontological and epistemological critique of liberalism and towards more problematic areas, like their own constructive theories and their practical differences (or lack thereof) from liberals. Moreover, this shift revealed the enormous differences among the constructive agendas of the diverse communitarian thinkers. This internaI diversity tended to undermine the focus and credibility of the communitarian project. Perhaps this deep ambiguity helps to explain why many of the most prominent thinkers generally identified as 'communitarians' (such as Taylor and MacIntyre) have failed to embrace the labe1. 34 l do not want to daim that communitarians necessarily fail at this point, but simply that this is a far more difficult ground than the deconstruction and critique of particular liberal theories. It is also an area in which they are forcefully confronted with the problem ofunderstanding pluralism and its relation to their conceptions of community.35 By the mid- to late-1990s and new the millennium, this debate seemed to have exhausted much ofits vitality, at least as a defining issue of contemporary moral and political thought. The sharp distinction between liberals and communitarians appeared increasingly blunt and unwieldy. LiberaIs, on the one hand, increasingly began to identify themselves as communitarians of a sort,36 or at least as effectively indistinguishable from communitarians in the important senses, and, on the other, they emphasized that there is nothing that really distinguishes so-called communitarians from liberals, or at least nothing very credible. 37 One important difference that many communitarians emphasized was that they also identified themselves as pluralists (recognizing a diversity of living communities and diverse forms ofhuman flourishing).38 This shift in identification seemed to dilute the significance of the liberal-communitarian debate, and to mark an evolution in discourse in the direction of a liberal-pluralist dichotomy.39 At the same time, the residual plausibility of the diverse values communitarians championed reenforced the pluralist

12

challenge to liberalism. Finally, much of the communitarian ontological and epistemological critique of liberal foundations seemed to be readily adaptable to a basic pluralist orientation. In sorne degree, many of the former communitarian challengers of liberalism now appeared, in the light of a shift of focus, as pluralist challengers, but this latter designation also encompassed a range of writers and streams of discourse which had not prominently been part of the earlier debate. The essential question which is begged by the emergence of a liberal-pluralist debate is whether this distinction is finally very much sharper, clearer, and more informative than the liberal-communitarian distinction. If liberal values can be understood first and foremost as the values of a particular community, could they not equally be embraced as one value or set of values among other possibilities? In essence, could liberals not themselves be pluralists just as weIl as they could be communitarians? As Ronald Beiner has it, "The official ideology of liberal society, endlessly expounded by liberal theorists, is of course rich diversity - the rich multiplicity of different conceptions of the good or the ends of life.,,40 Prominent American liberals like Ronald Dworkin, John Rawls and Richard Rorty identified at least limited pluralism ofvarious sorts as integral to their theories of liberalism. Each nonetheless attempted to preserve a basis for a broad-based reasonable public consensus at least on the basic principles of politicallife in liberal constitutional regimes. Must liberals reject or provide only limited to recognition to moral and political pluralism, or is it possible to be both a strong liberal and a strong pluralist? Berlin is of particular interest in the initial communitarian-liberal debate because he is identified as both a liberal and a communitarian, indeed a 'liberal communitarian.,41 He was a living embodiment of the fallacy which vitiated the debate (that is, ofthe sharp distinction between the two opposed positions) - he exemplifies the possibility of a communitarian defense of liberalism and a liberal defense of communitarianism. In the second dcbate, Berlin secms to occupy an at least equally intriguing position, as he is identified even more widely as a strong pluralist, but equally (although not usually simultaneously) as a strong liberal. Again, Berlin seems to bridge the debate, a pluralist liberal, and indeed to implicitly challenge its very coherence. On the other hand, this

13

straddling of positions sheds light on the marked tendency of critics to find him incoherent or self-contradictory. Under the weight of the new liberal-pluralism debate, the value pluralist position, and more specifically the Berlinian legacy itself, is widely seen by pluralists in contrast or opposition to the more firmly established mainstream approach to political theory in Anglo-American discourse. Berlin is construed first and foremost as a strong (sometimes even an absolute) pluralist. On the other hand, defenders of liberalism have been apt to see him first and foremost as a strong liberal. My argument is that both accounts are true enough in their own ways, but that each focuses exclusively on a single aspect of Berlin's thought, and consequently misses the important larger picture. He was in fact both a strong pluralist and a strong liberal (at least on his own account ofwhat a strong liberal would be), as well indeed as a strong communitarian. His thought and work, then, does threaten to vitiate the frame both of the liberal-communitarian debate and liberal-pluralist debate. Berlin's thought embraces much of the communitarian and pluralist critique of deontological and universalist liberalism, but reveals this to be to a large degree an internaI critique, effectively accommodated within the diverse liberal tradition. Berlin's synthesis, however, is not conceived as final or definitive, nor is it achieved without incurring costs: first, liberalism is not viewed as embodying universal truths, or as culminating a process of historical development, or as otherwise sharply privileged over all other models. In the language 1will develop in chapters 3, his thought is moderately and consistently historicist. Second, Berlin's moral and political thought and particularly his liberalism, encompass a diverse set ofparticular, historical, basic models subject to ongoing change, and these models in turn exhibit a rough and volatile range of internally pluralistic and rivalrous ultimate values. This diversity of basic models and values introduces the danger of radical choice, and hence the ideas of moral risk and tragedy, into the very core of
western moral and political thought, and in Berlin's construction into liberalism itself.

This pluralist innovation has important implications for the subject, techniques and content of political thought - it generates a political thought which on the one hand is far more interpretive, open-ended, historical, and even artistic, and on the other more volatile and morally perilous than that to which most contemporary readers will be accustomed.

14

Berlin offers a unique and powerful answer to the question with which we began, "what is it to be a liberal?" To bring out the quality of Berlin's liberalism is a central project of this dissertation. Again, Berlin's liberalism seems to me to be particularly worthy of attention, particularly in the context of the contemporary liberal-pluralist debate. In essence then, Berlin challenged the dynamics of contemporary Anglo-American political thought by showing through the example of his own work that communitarians and pluralists can weIl be liberals and vice versa. In so doing, Berlin also challenged the dominant conception ofwhat liberalism entails. This challenge in particular, 1 believe, warrants more rigorous and sustained examination than it has yet received.

l.iv Methodological Overview

There are reasons then that motivate a re-examination of Berlin's thought, and .particularly the application of his thought to moral, and especially political matters, and most particularly to the concept of politicalliberalism. This objective, however, proves more difficult and e1usive than it might first appear. At least four obstacles immediately confront the proj ect of identifying an authoritative and compelling reading of Berlin. These obstacles can be broadly characterized as (l) the diversity of interpretation, (2) internaI anomalies, (3) unsystematic character, and (4) interdisciplinary scope. First, while there has been an important and perceptibly growing critical interest in Berlin, particularly since his death, interpretations of Berlin have been quite diverse. Second, the one point that the established interpretations almost universally agree on is that there are serious difficulties, even antinomies or contradictions built into the structure of his thought. Third, Berlin's thought is not systematic - as Michael Walzer has it, "system is not his style. ,,42 Indeed, Berlin displays a consistent suspicion of, and perhaps even an antagonism to, rigid, elaborate systems of thought. As Berlin himself puts it, "1 do not find all-embracing systems, vast metaphysical edifices, conducive.,,43 Berlin's thought is not comprehensively deve10ped or displayed in any one place, but is rather spread across
an extraordinary wealth of essays, most of which take up and develop a thread, or a few

threads, in what is, it rapidly becomes apparent, quite a complex conceptual tapestry. Fourth, Berlin's central interests and themes show little respect for the boundaries between formaI disciplines. As Galipeau has it,

15

His professional interests coyer many fields in addition to moral and political philosophy: music and literary criticism, historiography, scholarship in the history of ideas, cultural interpretation, translation, teaching, university and arts 44 administration, diplomacy, community work, and broadcasting. AlI ofthese qualities interfere with the simple distillation of a generally acknowledged, authoritative and compelling reading of Berlin. Nonetheless, l think that these obstacles can be overcome, in part because l have become convinced that Berlin's intention, as well as his achievement, is far more coherent than his detractors, and indeed many of those otherwise sympathetic with him, have hitherto allowed. In particular, all of Berlin's work, across all of these areas of inquiry, reflect a basic similarity of approach. By focusing on distilling his basic approach, his most basic ideas and the way these shape his thought, rather than on exposing an elaborate system of thought, many of the difficulties connected with rigorously systematizing his thought can be avoided. Moreover, while many of Berlin's essays and books are focused on the history of ideas, sometimes on specific thinkers (or writers, composers, public figures, or political issues) or periods or events, there are also essays where Berlin adopts a more general posture, and focuses on drawing together his ideas, and illuminating their significance for whole fields of inquiry, such as politics or history, and these may be employed in sorne degree as guides to his more narrowly focused works and their relationships.45 l will schematically consider the most important established interpretations of Berlin, and the difficulties they present, as a preliminary exercise to developing my own reading in detai1. While these established readings clash on very central points, and are, l will argue, each ultimately unsatisfactory, they nevertheless contain a great deal of valuable analysis and insight, each importantly illuminating at least sorne important aspects of Berlin's work. In the next chapter l will briefly introduce two main lines of interpretations l will employ to organize the bulk of critical and interpretive work on Berlin: in essence, he is seen either as at heart ultimately committed to (either strong or weak) liberalism or as ultimately committed at heart to (either a strong or absolute) pluralism. l will argue, by contrast, that Berlin embraces both liberalism and pluralism as equally ultimate values within an uneasypolitical equilibrium.

16

In outlining my reading, l draw primarily on two types of sources, first, on Berlin's own published writings, and second, on his major critics and interpreters. The former category includes a great deal of material of course, and a good deal of it outside the strict boundaries ofpolitical theory. Berlin's thought was itselfmulti-disciplinarythat is to say, he saw morality, politics, art as intimately related to one another, bound up with the same (or recognisably similar) competing models, but applying their light to different subjects (personal conduct, interpersonal conduct, creative activity, and others). Since my objective is to bring out, and later to defend, the basic model which oriented Berlin's thought, it seems appropriate to treat the full spectrum of his writing as far as possible. The already substantial corpus of Berlin's published work has grown prodigiously in the past five years with a veritable spate of posthumous books, so that the sum is more than adequate to sustain the argument that follows. While there is significant criticalliterature on Berlin, and particularly on his two concepts of freedom, and many pieces are of great merit and interest, three critics of Berlin stand out as of special significance, namely Claude l Galipeau, John Gray, and Michael Ignatieff. These three have written most extensively about Berlin, and with greater care and detail than most of Berlin's other interpreters and critics. Ignatieffs book,

lsaiah Berlin: A Life (1998), moreover, is, as Berlin's official and authorized biography
(undertaken at his behest and with his full cooperation), ofparticular interest. Ignatieffis at any rate an intriguing and challenging writer in his own right, and his book would be of great interest even without all of the unique access to Berlin that it plainly reflects. Of course, as a biography it contains a good deal of material which is of only tangential interest in developing an Interpretation of Berlin's political thought and liberalism. However, like Berlin's own biographical efforts,46 Ignatieffs is in large part an intellectual biography, centrally concerned with the development of ideas, rather than a mere chronology of important events. Ignatieffs book would warrant special attention based on its three chapters dealing with Berlin's mature work alone, but in fact its interest extends far beyond these. C.l Galipeau's lsaiah Berlin's Liberalism (1994) offers a sustained, book length exposition of Berlin's political philosophy as a whole indeed, in pursuing this

objective, Galipeau is soon forced to try to distill Berlin's general philosophy, and even

17

touches on his views of music and literature. Beyond this, Galipeau demonstrates not only a comprehensive familiarity with Berlin's writing, but a great sense of the subtlety and nuance of Berlin's prose, and an acute perception ofhow sorne of the major themes fit together, even across quite different disciplines, in Berlin's basic approach or model. With that said, however, 1 want also to stress that while 1think that a great deal of what Galipeau is both correct and important, there are points on which 1 do not think that his arguments do justice to Berlin, and 1 do also think that, for better or worse, he leaves a great deal out. 1think that Galipeau does better justice to the conventional features of Berlin's thought than the truly unconventional. Finally, John Gray's book, simply titled Isaiah Berlin (1996), is, 1think, the most purely interesting of the books on Berlin. In a sense, Gray's treatment is a natural counter-balance to Galipeau's, for where Galipeau excelled in evoking and describing the relatively conventional elements of Berlin's thought, Gray specializes in focusing our attention on the innovative, deeply troubling, even radical elements. In sketching out, for example, the full significance of Berlin's concept of pluralism, Gray is unequaled. This crude distinction helps to explain how Gray and Galipeau's portraits of Berlin can be so different. They are, to sorne degree, interested in different facets oftheir subject. Of course, 1 do not propose to limit my sources to these three major critics, only to allow them a slight pride ofplace. Many of the critical articles on Berlin, including sorne of the earliest, however, remain indispensable. 47 There are also three prominent collections of essays dedicated to Berlin,The Idea ofFreedom: Essays in Honour of

Isaiah Berlin (1979), Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration (1991), and The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin (2001) and, of course an enormous number of other discussions concerning him. 48
There is also a book-length critique by Robert Kocis, A Critical Appraisal ofSir lmiah

Berlin's Political Philosophy (1989). 49

1 have suggested a satisfactory reading of Berlin has yet to emerge, that many of
cven the most basic points have proved deeply contentious. In part, this has been the

result ofbringing to Berlin's work the very assumption that he was most anxious to contest namely, monism. This monism has led many critics to interpret Berlin through

a sort offalse dichotomy, distorting him into either an a priorist liberal, or a kind of relativist. Other confusions have also undermined the effort to come to grips with Berlin,

18

but this has perhaps been the most prominent. The consequence has generally been to overemphasize or distort or take out of context important elements of Berlin's thought, and to force the rest his work into conformity with this distorted element, or, in sorne cases, to despair of any consistency at aIl. Although the three principal critics l mentioned, all of whom have been relatively recent contributors, each avoids, or at least mitigates, the monist presumption in interpreting Berlin, l think the general pattern of exaggerating elements, and forcing his thought into conformity with them, extends to them as well, if in lesser degree. l will endeavor to show that my reading does greater justice to the whole of Berlin's thought, better explaining its parts and animating its essential drive. With all of this in mind, l have tried, at least in terms of the core interpretation, to re1y as much as possible on Berlin's own words and expressions, and to frequently introduce his own text into this dissertation. There are certainly difficulties with Berlin's thought, and l think that he would be the first to deny that his work determined anything decisive1y, or once and for aIl. It is rather directed to how we might best think about our political problems right now. Political foundations, regardless of the form of the metaphor, need not be always solid and permanent, or, at the other end of the spectrum, absent or chaotic. They may be something in between, something perceptible but unstable, residing in the kinds of commitments that we must hold, but also question - and yet these commitments may be no less sacred for their impermanence. The appeal to contingent but defensible sources is a major key to Berlin's work, but it begs a host of questions. How do we question our basic commitments? How do we decide between them, even provisionally? How do we discern these hazy, protean foundations? How do we live with the on-going doubts that they engender? Berlin offers sorne answers, and sorne examples or demonstrations of what such thinking might look like, but there are also points he leaves to obscure, points which demand amplification. We are not, however, properly confronted with such
points, and their corresponding demands as long as we remain in the thrall of one-sided

interpretations. We cannot properly develop Berlin's contribution, or bring the full power ofhis thought to bear on other major positions in political thought, as long as we remain so handicapped. My argument is not that my reading of Berlin solves all problems or fills in all the important gaps in Berlin's thought; my contention is only that it offers a

19

better, more complete and persuasive perspective, closer to his apparent intentions, than the available alternatives. To distill this reading l do not think that anything beyond the broad parameters l have outlined and a real affection for Berlin's texts is required. Sorne final comments on the subject ofterminology may be helpful. Berlin's was a highly rhetorical writer, and his use ofterms tends to be somewhat idiosyncratic and he often varies his key terms. Values, ends, goals, goods, are employed seemingly interchangeably, as are expressions like political theory and political philosophy. Similarly, Great Goods, ultimate values or ends or goals seem to designate essentially the same thing. l will try to focus on the expressions 'values', and 'ultimate values' for the sake of clarity and consistency. We will also see that Berlin employs expressions like quasi-universals and objective values and duties and the idea of rights in distinctive ways. These are all given explanation, and on inspection do, l think, flow understandably from his basic orientation, but without careful investigation, and keeping their distinctive use in mind, they can easily give rise to confusion. In a similar way, Berlin often shifts from discussion of concepts to discussion of values. This proclivity stems from his sense that the concepts and values are intimately intertwined. The concepts employed in moral and political theory he considers deeply evaluative, as we will see, while values draw on closely related concepts. Thus, for example, the concept of equality in its most basic sense designates "counting for one," so that when a person, for example, may be said to count for one in the relevant way, he may be said to be equal. The deployment ofthis criterion, however, already implies a degree of evaluation, in essence, the judgement that this criterion represents the meaningful and appropriate category of analysis. If an additional element of valuation is added, so one may say that a person ought to be free, the concept of equality slides over into the a value of equality. The point is that, for Berlin, the two categories are not so very distant to begin with.
Two further expressions that will be employed throughout the text may be sites of

serious difficulty. The first is the idea of moral knowledge. This term is meant to very loosely designate knowledge ofwhat people should be or do. 50 The other expression is modemity or the modern West. Part of the difficulty here is that this refers to a historical epoch which many feel, and certainly is intended for present purposes, to continue to

20

characterize our own time. 51 It is understandably difficult to be specifie and authoritative about an epoch which remains incomplete, and in fact frames the inquiry itself. 1 take the term modem to refer in its full sense to the Romantic and Post-Romantic periods, that is, the latter nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The West refers primarily to Western Europe and North America.

Lv An Introduction to Berlin's Political Thought

1 am not yet in a position to lay out or to defend my reading of Berlin's political thought in any detai1. The following description is meant only as a very crude introduction, directed simply to allowing the reader to anticipate the general flow of the following argumentation, particularly in relation to the two most prominent lines of interpretation. My reading of Berlin boils down to three c1aims about his political thought: (first,) Berlin's thought is moderately but consistently historicist (rather than universalistic or realistic), even in terms of his understanding of liberal values and pluralism itself. This historicism leads Berlin to develop a modest, interpretive form of political thought grounded on an account of contemporary human nature which incorporates both recently emergent and quasi-universal categories of experience and values. (Second,) his chief insight is into recognizable strong pluralism in the modem West, that is, a specifie open-ended range of ultimate values which, he contends, warrant recognition in modem Western public life, and correspondingly to the idea of an untidy

andflexible equilibrium as the focal point of public discourse, and the importance of
respecting not just persons as such, but also their expressed ends, and of the possibility of rationally inarbitrable collisions between them. This leads to two key lines of argument: (i.) a descriptive argument for meta-ethical pluralism, which he believes supports a general open-minded disposition sensitive to the possibility of multiple valid answers to moral and philosophical problems; and (ii.) a normative and descriptive case for a loose basic model or set of models which describe the open-ended range ofthe ultimate values which he argues makes the best sense of our moral and politicallife. (Third and) finally, Berlin develops an understanding of liberalism consistent with, but not exc1usively grounded on, his view of pluralism, a distinctively pluralist liberalism. This pluralist liberalism focuses on discourse, understanding and persuasion within a public domain framed as an uneasy equilibrium of rivalrous ultimate values. This equilibrium

21

encompasses, among other values, negative liberty and pluralism itself. These three claims, ifthey can be successfully defended, lead to a reading of Berlin's as a historicist and pluralist liberalism. This reading, 1 will argue, has much to recommend it. It explains and relates a great deal of Berlin's work without falling into the tensions, contradictions and exclusions that plague the major interpretations currently extant, and clarifies and re-enforces the contemporary relevance of Berlin's work, while sustaining a strong cohesion with his texts and the drift ofhis general argumentation. In particular, 1 will argue that Berlin's thought avoids important issues of underdevelopment, underdetermination and/or inconsistency which arise on the main established readings of him. In essence, 1 argue that Berlin defends a conditionalliberalism, loosely cohesive yet susceptible to its very core to radical and tragic conflict, as the most compelling perspective for us now, as citizens of the contemporary West. Although Berlin allows that this position will by no means convince aIl honest, sane, rational readers, he thinks it will either convince or accord with the views of at least sorne, and that is enough to set up a meta-ethical argument for pluralism of basic models, of foundations, which feeds potently back into the plausibility of the claim of strong pluralism. It is at the level ofBerlin's particular understanding of modern Western human nature at which his most substantial and controversial claims are advanced. Nonetheless, the meta-theoreticallevel of this thought also makes a decisive thrust - not in propounding a specifie basic model, or concepts of human nature, or ultimate value, but in encouraging a modest, open-minded, discursive disposition towards both moral and political means and ends. In essence, it promotes a tragic or pluralistic orientation in contrast to a monist or ironie one, recognizing that the values and goals that persons, groups and nations may reasonably pursue are many, and while there is ample room for debate and persuasion, there is no adequate grounds for dismissal. His thought is not presented as hierarchical, systematic or comprehensive. Its posture is both open and discursive, but there is a tangible sense in which it is not quite fully theoretical, that at sorne decisive point, where liberal theories characteristically blossom into positive construction and systematization, that Berlin hangs back, content to remain to an exceptional degree in the nether world of criticism. This reluctance to

22

advance a comprehensive theory of real substance is widely remarked upon by friend and foe alike, and is generally accounted a failing, sometimes a mark of cowardice 'he

failed to stand up and be counted', or often, 'his pluralism undermined his liberalism.' l want to advance a contrary thesis. l want to argue that Berlin's reluctance to advance any general, comprehensive theory of politicalliberalism is fully intentional, and reflective of his view of pluralist liberalism, which does not require, indeed which adopts a highly skeptical posture towards, any rigid or comprehensive formulation, or absolute or a priori construction; in essence, Berlin thinks that liberalism is better off without comprehensive, objective or transcendental baggage. He explores and defends the ideas he takes to be central to liberalism - liberty, equality, a sense ofbelonging, justice, civility, toleration and pluralism - and he relates these values to others he thinks essential, such as truth, and sincerity, but he does not seem to believe that these values are reducible to any single type of c1aim, nor are they susceptible of grand and integrated synthesis they do not conveniently dovetail into any systematic matrix. They are

distinct and sometimes rivalrous. Their relations are complex and at best only interpretively grasped. They are at their c1earest in relation to particular cases, rather than in the abstracto Berlin's moral and political world is always contextual, always vulnerable to change. Ifthis is true then Berlin's thought is in a sense both irreduceably complex and epistemologically modest. Although Berlin's thought is not comprehensive or systematic, but from the beginning interpretive and open-ended, he does offer a provisional development and defense of liberalism, however inchoate. He also recognizes values which are not necessarily liberal, such as sincerity, truth, mercy, and particularly self-understanding. These interests perhaps help to explain why sorne have questioned the completeness of his commitment to liberalism, particularly when seen in combination with sorne of his surprisingly sympathetic essays on sorne deeply romantic and decidedly illiberal, thinkers. Above aIl, one has the distinct impression from his essays that it is pluralism as revealed through the sympathetic imagination, as both a condition and a value, and the possibilities for human choice that it opens up both in public and private life, persons' c1aim to choose for themselves, despite any moral risk that might be entailed, that most exercise his passion, which inspire his most vivid flights of imagery on one side, and his

23

most sober warnings on the other - in essence, that animate and drive his work. If the art of research is to see the passion in the crumbs, as the first epigram of this dissertation suggests, then it is at this point that 1 must locate Berlin's deepest passion. Pluralism is a recognizable and essential aspect of our moral condition as well as being for him an ultimate value among others. Despite the difficulty of reduction in this case, let me try to schematically summarize how 1want to read Berlin as a 'pluralist liberal.' Berlin draws on a wide array of arguments, historical, analytical, empirical, normative to commend the logically untidy, flexible, agitated political equilibrium of rival ultimate values, and to inveigh primarily against the presumptive daims of traditional and modern forms of monism which insist on the self-evidence of a single human truth, and which advance daims of moral or political certainty. These presumptive forrns ofmonism encompass a very wide scope of modern thought, induding fascist, communist, authoritarian theories and many mainstream Western forms of political thought, as well as many contemporary forms of politicalliberalism. Berlin defends his pluralist liberal position within a particular context, first and foremost in the modern West. Liberalism is defended as one set of values among others, which are also of the first importance. The basic plurality of the range of Great Goods introduces the threat of radical and tragic conflict, and the problem of moral risk, which Berlin calls on liberals and civilized people to accept. Berlin is interested both in specifie philosophical problems and problems relating to philosophical thought itself, about what philosophy is and how we might go about doing it, although he is very reserved about giving definitive, final answers. He seeks to darifY terms and at most to offer reasoned opinions. Indeed, uncertainty both in regard of question and framework are, in his view, characteristic of philosophical problems. In other words, he is interested in both theoretical and meta-theoretical problems - questions both within western thought and about western thought in general. He wants both to advance particular arguments and to explore the frameworks within which arguments are advanced. His inquiry proceeds in a sense on two levels, one investigating particular questions, concepts, thinkers and arguments, while the other inquires into the preconceptions of the questions and the instruments, models and objectives that we bring to treating questions. Berlin is interested in problematizing these preconceptions, in

24

criticizing them, and ultimately in drawing out the most compelling interpretation possible as a basis for approaching contemporary political problems. This generalline of inquiry is both descriptive and normative, and in his hands it ultimately produces a model of pluralist liberalism. These two lines of inquiry are intricately interwoven throughout Berlin's books and essays. The simultaneous pursuit of these two levels of inquiry, and particularly Berlin's lightning shifts from one focus to the other, has, 1 would suggest, on the one hand been responsible for a great deal of confusion in the interpretation of his work, but on the other is also responsible for much of its dynamism, force and exhilaration. Both the problem and the framework, the question and the techniques for approaching the question, are always both in the air in genuine1y philosophical problems, and each informs the other, so that their relationship too is important. Sorne critics have thus compared Berlin's Wfiting with a kind of out-of-control juggling act, lurching from point to point, but for Berlin, this difficult endeavor is precisely what it means to philosophize. Berlin's view, at bottom, is a descriptive-normative hybrid. Both aspects are in sorne degree evaluative or interpretive, and are treated as mutually influential. Ifthis interpretation of Berlin's thought is credible, then 1think it can be effectively argued that he has a very original and compelling conception of political theory, far removed from mainstream American scholarship, and worthy of more careful consideration and development. He conceived political theory as a remarkably open, self-critical pursuit concemed first and foremost with troubling questions that we do not know how to answer and the kinds of middle-ground concepts and values that such questions and problems elicit. It is directed to c1arifying our concepts and sharpening our thinking so that we may recognize when people are 'talking rot', and ultimately to better understand our own thinking and behavior and finally ourselves. 52 It is an inherently interpretive, evaluative, even an aesthetic undertaking, limited in terms of universality or permanence. It thrives on fundamental critique, on discussion ofultimate, foundational concepts, values and models. It is integrally bound up with history as a medium for grasping basic concepts and models. Within this framework, Berlin advances an argument for an equally distinctive conception of liberalism as both intemally and extemally pluralistic. In terms of contemporary political theory, the implications of Berlin's political thought seem radical, and certainly they do depart sharply from

25

mainstream Anglo-American conceptions of political theory, and indeed mainstream conceptions of politicalliberalism, but they also seems to anticipate a good deal of the current counter-culture in political theory, particularly that which identifies itself with value pluralism.

I.vi Berlin's Moderate but Consistent Historicism

In the last section 1have sketched out the raw skeleton of my main line of argument in three general c1aims about Berlin. 1will now try dress these bones in at least a thin veil of flesh by explaining in more detail what 1 mean by these three main daims. All of the established readings of Berlin 1 will outline in the next section attribute to him universal c1aims, often grounded in accounts ofhuman nature, which in turn are employed to support certain values whose centrality is taken to be similarly universal (such as, negative liberty in general, or at least a core of negative liberty, or selfcreation). 1 argue that Berlin does not make c1aims ofthis type. On the contrary, he points out a number of reasons why such c1aims, which presume 'certainty' about universal features of human nature, are bound to founder. First of all, there is in his view no scientific or rational method which allows us to achieve universal certainty. Secondly, such c1aims of universal human nature are always formulated within a given particular context, a collective form of life or expressive whole which enmeshes us in myriad impalpable conceptual and moral strands, in this case our common modern, Western culture. These concepts will then, at least initially, be infused with the values which are characteristic ofthat particular time and place (or, ifit is internally pluralistic, at least sorne ofthose values). In essence, there is no, in Nagel's words, "view from nowhere."S3 We have no universal Archimedean standpoint from which we can view our own time and place. All theories come from somewhere, and barring conc1usive evidence to the contrary, we should view them as oriented from their particular perspectives, and consequently subject to transformation. In other words, the default position, until
somcthing is conclusively demonstrated to the contrary, is that our moral and political

c1aims are deeply informed by our particular context. This skepticism ofboth c1aims to certainty and universality emanate from Berlin's basic historicist orientation. This approach, which Berlin characterizes as "one of the

26

greatest discoveries in the history ofthought," he attributes first and foremost to Neapolitanjurist Giambattista Vico. He describes Vico's "transforming insight," as the realization that ideas evolve, that human knowledge is not a static framework of eternal, universal truths, either Platonic or Cartesian, but a social process, [and] that this process is traceable through (indeed, in a sense is identical with) the evolution of symbols - words, gestures, pictures, and their altering patterns, . f unctlOns, structures and uses .... 54 Berlin argues that this insight splits the humanities from the natural sciences. Since the humanities are concerned with human beings and their shifting ideas, perspectives, and experiences, they require a historicist approach. Indeed, the humanities themselves are bound up with this on-going evolution of ideas. The humanities, therefore, aspire to a best "understanding," based on coherence and better and worse interpretation, rather than the "factual knowledge" of the natural sciences. 55 Certainly we have an immediate experience of our own time, but mediated through concepts and categories we cannot affirm with certainty. After all, we have ample evidence that the certainties of one age and culture are frequently groundless delusions when viewed from another. 56 Moreover, Berlin argues that there are present beliefs that lead us to doubt, with reason, that conclusive evidence is likely. Philosophical moral and political problems are precise1y those that evade simple formaI or empirical demonstration, which invoke complex, evaluative concepts. Moral and political theory is focused "on the particular nexus between descriptive and evaluative concepts which governs the language we use and the thoughts we think. ,,57 Certainly Berlin himself expresses a beliefthat there are human moral universals, but this is a matter of opinion, not of certainty - thus he equally allows that human beings may not turn out to be moral creatures at al1. 58 He similarly suggests that we recognize ends or values-in-themselves in ourselves and others, embodied in our language, thought, action, and even our identities, which may be said to attain to a kind of objectivity for us, in that they actually inform our lives. We cannot, however, have any certain moral knowledge as to their enduring truth. On the other hand, however, Berlin's historicism is moderated by the idea of the sympathetic imagination. He argues that human beings seem generally to be endowed with a capacity for sympathetic imaginative understanding - what Vico calledfantasia

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and Herder Einfuhlung - which may aHow partial insight into, and understanding of, distant historical periods and cultures, and diverse basic models within a given form of life. The imaginative exercise of comparing and contrasting these values with those held in other periods and cultures, with, for example, those which characterize our own, may do a great deal to reveal and constrain our own culturaHy grounded presumptions, but there can be no guarantee that they can be eliminated entirely. In other words, our claims regarding universal human nature, at least insofar as they extend beyond basic physical facts 59 and assume moral significance, are always conjectural or speculative rather than certain or necessarily universal. Indeed, the absence of certainty would remain in principle even if we could somehow confirm that every known human culture shared some important moral feature, for to move from this hypothetical descriptive fact to a claim of necessity would involve the further unwarranted assumption that this feature must necessarily characterize aH possible human cultures including future ones in other words, a faHacy of reification

or naturalism. In our particular case, these difficulties in making firm presumptive assertions about human nature are further exacerbated by internaI pluralism within our own culture which reaches aH the way down to conceptions ofhuman nature: liberals, Marxists, Christians, Buddhists and neo-fasists will disagree about the dominant features of universal human nature, while many post-modernists and contemporary skeptics will deny that there is any universal human nature in the relevant moral sense at aIl. There is nonetheless for Berlin an evident possibility of communication and understanding between proponents ofthese views, between diverse cultures and between historical epochs which provides important empirical evidence of some common or very general features of human nature. 60 If we cannot achieve certainty about what the overaH composition of this general human nature, or even extend it to coyer aH cases (particularly future ones), and indeed even if it takes the elusive forms of a complex and
shifting core of physical features, categories of thought, and flexible basic values and

concepts, we can at least offer more and reject less plausible interpretations ofwhat it might include. These interpretations help to explain how the reconstructive work of the sympathetic imagination is possible and offers some support to particular inter-historical

28

and cultural judgments. The status ofBerlin's interpretation ofhuman nature, however, has frequently been exaggerated in the critical and interpretive literature. Berlin's is first and foremost a philosophy of the here and now, a perspective which defines itselffrom the beginning as temporary, provisional, impermanent, as openended and (at least in a very broad sense) local. Yet, for aIl this, it is not conceived as wholly arbitrary or contingent, but, at least in the present circumstances, as successfully defensible against many alternative conceptions, and in particular against traditional and modem monist conceptions. It is presented as at least a reasonable, and at best the most persuasive account available under the circumstances. Berlin's thought is then from the beginning historicist or particularist, but it is not for that reason isolated, or hermetically sealed off, or dismissive or despairing of, communication, understanding, or judgment of other perspectives either within or between human cultures and historical periods. In communicating and pursuing understanding, we must, like aIl ages, think in terms of normative conceptions of what it is to be fully or properly human, as a means of understanding ourselves, our goals and motivations, as a basis to judge, and indeed condemn, practices, principles and ideas which we find utterly abhorrent. Without sorne such idea, we will find it hard enough to think or act, let alone communicate and understand: we will be literally disoriented. This is an important c1aim in Berlin, derived from both Kant and Herder, that we always operate in terms of sorne particular perspective, in terms of a complex network of presumed notions. 6l In essence, we exhibit on the one hand a particular identity, a set of values, concepts, feelings, experiences and insights which are part of who we are, which are each of us rather than being ours in the sense of possessions whose gain or loss would not integrally affect us. We are also characteristically part of larger communities which share, or at least understand, sorne of these values, concepts, feelings, insights. The community represents an environment within which we can communicate naturally, in
which wc fecl at home. Both individual and cultural identity are living, dynamic,

profoundly inter-related concerns of political thought. Reading Berlin in this way, as a moderate but consistent historicist, but by virtue of this very fact demanding that we be concerned with normative concepts, even interpretive universals (provided they remain provisional), certainly distinguishes this

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reading from all of the established readings of Berlin, which are each in their own way universalist, a priori, and permanent conceptions. My reading of Berlin differs at root then from all four of the established lines of Berlin interpretation in rejecting any presumptive daim to strict universality or certain moral or political knowledge.

Lvii Berlin's Strong Pluralism

The established readings of Berlin generally see him embracing a dominant value of one sort or another. Liberal readings of Berlin attribute to him an a priori commitment either to an extensive range, or at least a core minimum of, negative liberty, characteristically on a universal basis. The main pluralist readings of Berlin see him embracing self-creation and pluralism as uniquely constitutive of human beings. 1 will argue that neither of these values is in itself dominant, but that both are part of a range of recognizable equally ultimate values in the modern West. 1 will argue that for Berlin, a diversity ofultimate moral and political values (ends, obligations, goods, virtues) are, at least for 'us,' when we speak in a collective sense, as a group or nation or politYor culture, a recognizable feature of our condition. In sorne cases, such values seem incompatible and incommensurable. Strong pluralism involves the daim than not only do such values exist, but they are (l) widely recognizable, and (2) are valuable and worthy not only of recognition but affirmation. This position further supports the embrace of a 100 se, flexible and open-ended equilibrium of ultimate values in public life: The best that can be done, as a general mIe, is to maintain a precarious equilibrium that will prevent the occurrence of desperate situations, of intolerable choices - that is the first requirement for a decent society; one that we can always strive fOf, in the light of the limited range of our knowledge, and even of our imperfect understanding of individuals and societies. Of course social and political collisions will take place; the mere conflict of positive values alone makes this inevitable. Yet they can, 1believe, be minimized by promoting and preserving an uneasy equilibrium, which is constantly threatened and in constant need of repair - that alone, 1repeat, is the precondition for decent societies and morally acceptable behavior, otherwise we are bound to lose our way.62 Such an equilibrium allows for the continuaI working out of the competition of values and the balancing of daims in specific cases. Where necessary, compromises and tradeoffs can be fashioned on the basis of mutual recognition in order to avoid situations of intolerable, agonizing choices which threaten the minimum decency thresholds of pluralistic values.
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Indeed, these pluralistic values, or concepts which have force for many of us, are frequently, on close inspection, demonstrably pluralistic internally as well - so liberty can take positive or negative forms, or equality may be conceived as similarity oftreatment or condition, or solidarity may take the forms of patriotism or nationalism, even of fascism - so that even if sorne one ofthese values could plausibly be generally elevated over the others, this would by no means necessarily lead to determinate results in particular cases, but would only introduce new sub-variants of pluralism. However, the internaI pluralism of moral and political concepts and values does not imply that any meaning at all can be attributed them, or that conflicts are generally irresolvable or inadjudicable. There remains a basic sense of moral values and concepts that is common to the pluralistic variants or metaphorical extensions of the value or concept in question. Berlin argues, for example, that the sense of freedom from chains, from arbitrary and general deprivation of significant choice, is fundamental to both positive and negative liberty, and similarly that the idea of similarity or 'counting for one and only one,63 is basic to both equality of treatment and equality of condition. In other words, the competing pluralistic formulations of a basic concept or value grow from the same seed, and retain the same essential root - it is in this respect that they are recognizable as variant cases of the basic form. Indeed, the basic extensions of the concept or value also exhibit core meanings, as in positive and negative liberty for example, although they can be formulated or combined in diverse ways. In essence, moral and political values and concepts are frequently layered in their meaning, in a way similar to the way that many words in general frequently becorne layered in their use and definition - that is, there is a basic sense or meaning of the word, and a series of literaI and metaphorical extensions, employments or applications: Unless sorne kernel of common meaning - whether a single common characteristic or a 'family resemblance' - is kept in mind, there is the danger that one or other of these senses will be represented as fundamental, and others will be
tortured into conformity with it, or dismissed as trivial or superficia1. The most

notorious examples of this process are the sophistries whereby various forms of compulsion and thought-control are represented as means to, or even constitutive of, 'true' freedom, or, conversely, liberal political or legal institutions are regarded as sufficient means of ensuring not only the freedom of, but opportunities for the use of such freedom by, persons who are too irrational or immature, owing to lack of education or other means of mental development, to understand or benefit by

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such rules or laws. It is therefore the central meaning of the term, ifthere is one, that it is important to establish. 64 Berlin introduces the example of liberty to demonstrate the importance of grasping the basic meaning of a term, and indeed this is one of the important goals in "Two Concepts of Liberty," which we will have occasion to explore further in Chapter 5. What is essential for the present purpose is the central importance of c1arifying the basic sense and the range of core metaphorical extensions. The fact that the ultimate values that make up the precarious equilibrium have at least an identifiable basic sense does not, however, rescue us from the possibility of endless dispute over their significance and ramifications for us, especially in particular cases, for the basic sense in itself is too general to strictly determine applied significance. If, for example, we invoke liberty, but in order to avoid controversy restrict ourselves to its basic sense, as Berlin understands it, then aIl we are told is that whatever the problem or conflict, we should at any rate avoid arbitrarily depriving people of aIl significant choice, and in most cases this will not take us very far towards resolution or judgment there willlikely be a variety of solutions which respect this requirement. There will also frequently be more than one ultimate value that can be invoked - say issues of basic truth and justice may be relevant, as weIl as of liberty and equality - and this may lead us into conflict between different basic senses of different basic values. The extensions or metaphors or applications of the basic idea are precisely efforts to link the basic sense of a value or concept to the actual challenges and difficulties that we experience, and consequently we have no choice but to work through them, or sorne new extension or metaphor, if we hope for sorne satisfactory resolution. In Berlin's view we must do aIl that we can to work our way through competing c1aims, c1ashing concepts, employing reason and imagination and an informed (if imperfect) sense of the basically human, and of ourseIves, to achieve a satisfactory (if imperfect) political
reconciliation, compromise or judgment in particular cases. ln this pursuit, however, we

must also remain aware that in sorne cases pluralism may run too deep for any rational reconciliation or even adjudication between competing c1aims. Sometimes our best and most sincere attempts at reasoning through a conflict leave us in the lurch. The competing c1aims may, for example, be incompatible, incommensurable, and hence

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radical or undecideable by direct appeal to reason. When this is the case, we will sometimes have to choose without the comforting support ofreason. For Berlin, the conflicts of ultimate values are not in themselves unnatural, nor do they necessarily discredit the c1ashing values themselves, such as positive and negative liberty, nor the basic concept from which they spring, in this case basic liberty itself. The point at which variants begin to become perverse and implausible is not the point at which they begin to attack and are attacked by other variants of the same or other values, but only at the point where they turn on the point of common origin, the shared root or basic sense of the value - thus positive liberty becomes perverse at the moment that it begins to justify the arbitrary deprivation of basic liberty in the name of freedom itself.

Lviii

Berlin's Pluralist Liberalism

Liberal readings present Berlin as a liberal first and a pluralist second and thus at most a limited or restricted pluralist. The pluralist readings of Berlin to date present him as a pluralist first, and generally see this primary commitment as interfering with his liberalism. 1 will argue that Berlin is a specifically pluralist liberal. The kernel of pluralist liberalism is to allow "a kind of system which permits pursuit of severaI values,,,65 which recognizes a diverse range of values, c1aims, basic models, and encourages both formaI and informaI public contestation over both the proper means and ends of public life. In Berlin's formulation, this involves a democratic framework recognizing a wide and open-ended range of equally ultimate public values which are taken as loose guidelines in the formulation of public policy, and which promote interaction, consultation and compromise according to particular cases: 1believe in a pluralist democracy, which demands consultation and compromise, which recognizes the c1aims - rights - of groups and individuals which, except in situations of extreme crisis, is forbidden to reject democratic decisions. 66 Berlin's vision is of a loose, untidy and continually agitated public equilibrium. His own particular pluralist liberalism inc1udes at least the following ultimate values: liberty (both negative and positive - especially in the sense of democracy), equality (of general opportunity and condition), community, justice, pluralism, civility, tolerance and no doubt a number of others, complemented with a strong sense of the essential importance

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of heterodoxy in public debate. This is conceived as a particularist, historicized liberalism addressed primarily to the nations of the modern West. Pluralist liberalism respects its liberal heritage by insisting on the inclusion of negative liberty, among the highest class of public values, and by reflecting the diversity of other values which have characterized the liberal tradition. On the other hand, it respects its plural heritage by encouraging public decisions to be made in relation to particular cases through the open and unconstrained contestation of values, informed by flexible and open-ended guidelines, "never final and absolute," recognizing widely held ultimate values. In this way, pluralist liberalism reconciles its joint commitments. None of this, however, is to suggest that Berlin was not a believer in negative liberty, or that he would not have defended it as a primary consideration in many specifie cases, particularly in terms of its minimum threshold demands, or that he did not believe that given its deeply ingrained status in Western life and discourse that it would not be accorded, in many cases, a distinctive level of de facto respect. The fact is, however, that he persistently included it among the range of rival ultimate values, concerning whose colliding claims in particular cases no 'overarching principle' could be enunciated, 'no hard and fast rules' distilled. He defended liberty passionately, particularly against deep authoritarian impositions, because it needed continuaI defense. It could not rely on any strict procedural priority. Similarly, he treats pluralism as among the range of recognizable equally ultimate values.

l.ix Berlin and Rawls

1will argue that there are profound differences between Berlin and Rawls over the nature of political theory and politicalliberalism which reflect important differences in the English and American traditions of political thought. These differences ultimately reflect two quite different receptions of pluralism. Berlin's central vision is characterized by a duality: on the one hand there is
fundamental moral and political diversity, on the other the possibility of recognition and

understanding ofthis diversity. This understanding renders possible the on-going accommodation ofpluralism in public life. For Berlin, liberalism can offer a particularly conducive environment for pluralism because it is capable of absorbing pluralism into the public sphere, and by consequence can encourage the mutual understanding necessary to

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sustain recognition. The central image of public life which emerges is of an unstable, logically untidy, agitated open-ended and flexible equilibrium, in need of constant care and attention, but capable of encouraging continued mutual recognition. Berlin's liberal public sphere is defined by the diversity of political values people are capable of recognizing through the exercise of sympathetic imagination. It is in large part a politics of difference and contestation. For Rawls, liberalism involves the establishment of a stable, regulative framework for public life in the form of a hierarchy of public principles ofjustice. This public conception ofjustice on the one hand will be capable of providing the grounds for the resolution of all or almost all disputes conceming the basic structure of society. It is grounded in the consensually-embraced political intuitions of reasonable citizens, which form a reasonable overlapping consensus. FormaI public debate on the basic structure of society or 'public reason' will be regulated in conformity with the public conception of justice and its ordered principles. The liberal public sphere is thus defined by what reasonable persons (holding reasonable comprehensive doctrines) consensually accept, not, as for Berlin, what they may or may not be capable ofrecognizing. Rawls' vision eventuates, at least ideally, in a relatively narrow and comprehensively ordered public sphere. Beneath these evidently quite different conceptions of public politicallife, lie, on the one hand, two quite different conceptions ofwhat the liberal disposition involves, and two quite different understandings ofpolitical theory. For Berlin, in essence, the liberal, or pluralist liberal disposition is directed to an understanding of differences, through argument, discourse, mutual persuasion, in which everything is in play, allowing for the possibility ofunbridgeable but reasonable differences. He insists that the understanding of such differences can be mutually illuminating. In this way, mutual respect and understanding are encouraged. For Rawls, the liberal disposition is defined, at least in
relation to public life, by a principle of reciprocity, whereby arguments draw only on

bases ofjustification that are already common to both sides. In this way, resolvability and stability are encouraged, and mutual understanding and respect are ensured. At the level ofpolitical theory, Berlin sees a philosophical discipline oriented to bringing to the surface and subjecting to on-going critique the basic models and

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conceptions ofhuman nature which give rise to fundamental differences. This discipline does not necessarily always give rise to agreement, but aspires at least to a clarification of differences, and the manner in which they influence diverse concepts and values, and lead to points of deep divergence. It produces a clearer self-understanding, and aUows people to more clearly understand and criticaUy assess the diverse bases for their beliefs and convictions. In essence, political theory is directed towards a clearer selfunderstanding of the essential condition ofbasic moral and political pluralism, which in turn supports the possibility of on-going mutual accommodation. For Rawls, political theory seems primarily directed towards the establishment of a stable and reasonable public order based on an underlying consensus of reasonable citizens. This public order is considered advantageous because it ensures stability, legitimacy and the continuity of a condition of reasonable pluralism, and thus prevents the degeneration of the conditions of public life into a state of simple pluralism, wherein the conditions for reasonable consensus on the rules and principles of public life are undermined. The essential contrast is, 1 will argue, traceable to a basic embrace of strong pluralism on Berlin's part, as both a recognizable and desirable condition of public life, and an effort to deny and avoid such a condition on Rawls' part.

l.x The Center of Berlin

FinaUy, 1want to consolidate this discussion by offering a very brief introduction to what 1take to be the center or core of Berlin's ideas. Perhaps the best way to begin is with Berlin's own ruminations on the course and character of his life and thought offered in his short acceptance speech upon being awarded the Jerusalem prize entitled "The Three Strands of My Life.,,67 Here Berlin suggests that his thought and identity draw on and incorporate three distinct sources or traditions Russian, British and Jewish. A

kind ofpluralism then lay at the core ofhis own identity. First, his Russian heritage produced his "enormous respect for the power of abstract ideas," as weU as his enduring
intcrcst in great art and artists. Second, his British heritage taught him the value of

patient empiricism, that "pluralism and untidiness are, to those who value freedom, better than the rigorous imposition of aU embracing systems, no matter how rational and disinterested," that "toleration of dissent is better than pride and a sense of national mission," the value of moderation and compromise and a rejection of claims of "absolute

36

certitude, absolute exactness." Third, his Jewish heritage taught him the human necessity of belonging, of membership in a greater whole, a community, in which one can feel at home: When men complain of loneliness, what they mean is that nobody understands what they are saying: to be understood is... to share common forms of life. This is an essential human need: to deny it is a dangerous fallacy. To be eut offfrom one's familiar environment is to be condemned to wither. 68 Berlin's life and thought is a weaving together ofthese motifs which, as he observes, may themselves come into irreconcilable conflict.
69

It is perhaps the tensions between these distinct and powerful but interwoven
sources of his identity which accounts for what 1 suggest is the most striking and unifying element ofhis thought - the importance of empathy, of sympathetic understanding. Ignatieff asserts that "empathy, for Berlin, was the central liberal aptitude." 70 1 want to push the insight a step further and say that sympathetic imaginative understanding was Berlin's central aptitude and the fountainhead ofhis thought. This is an idea Berlin draws from Vico, Herder and the restrained romantics. It is through imaginative reconstruction, here primarily of Machiavelli's thought, that he cornes to what he himself describes as his central insight,71 The idea that this planted in my mind was the realization, which came as something of a shock, that not all the supreme values pursued by mankind now and in the past were necessarily compatible with one another. 72 Berlin again echoes this as his central insight in an interview with Ramin Jahanbegloo: The idea that there can be two sides of a question, that there may be two or more incompatible answers, any one of which could be accepted by honest, rational men - that is a very recent notion. The merit of a free society is that it allows a great variety of conflicting opinions without the need for suppression - that is surely comparatively new in the West. 73 Berlin's central themes of strong pluralism emanates from his empathetic understanding
of the diversity of reasonable human beliefs. Berlin himself identifies this as his

inspirational source, and 1 think and will argue, that his case is persuasive. It is this insight, that legitimate values collide so that reason sometimes is helpless to decide questions, so that you and 1 may disagree, and yet understand one another, and even respect one another's reasons, empathize with one another, and still disagree, sometimes

37

irremediably and even tragically, that forms the crux ofhis thought. l want to suggest that this is the central, enduring image of Berlin's thought: two good friends who respect one another, and understand one another intimately, and still disagree fundamentally on the most basic values in particular cases. This insight into our pluralistic condition rather than into negative liberty or liberalism or relativism or naturallaw or self-creation represents his 'inner keep,' his

sanctum sanctorum, his passion. However, even at this point of passion, Berlin remains
aware that his insights spring from sympathetic understanding, from imaginative interpretation. He remains, l think, modest, and does not daim any absolute or universal status for this insight. Even Berlin's ultimate descriptive ground remains interpretive, in effect, irreducably evaluative. Berlin tells us "Pluralism is as near to objective values as l can get.,,74 Even this final ground cannot obtain objectivity: Objectivity in moraljudgment seems to depend on (almost consist in) the degree of constancy in human responses. This notion cannot in principle be made sharp and unalterable. Its edges remain blurred. 75 Ifpluralism does not attain objectivity or certainty in Berlin's thought, then nothing does. Still, modest, interpretive, historical and subject to change as Berlin's thought is, it nonetheless culminates in a strong, if particular, defense of a pluralist liberalism. This is not, however, the liberalism ofhis liberal interpreters, constrained by a prior commitment to negative liberty, nor that of his pluralist interpreters, expressing itself in supreme valuation of self-creation and diverse forms ofhuman flourishing, but a pluralist liberalism defined by a loose equilibrium of equally ultimate values, a limited but open-ended range, commonly recognizable within our contemporary form of life. The distillation of this reading, particularly in contrast with the political thought of John Rawls, helps to bring into focus the depth ofpluralism which continues to underlie political thought and liberalism today.

l.xi A Structural Overview

The central concem of this dissertation is the development and defense of a reading of Berlin's that makes better sense of, and does fuller justice to, Berlin's text than do the established readings, and, secondarily, to begin to infer the implications of such a position for the critique of Rawls and other mainstream American political thinkers. This introductory chapter is devoted to explaining this project, and suggesting at least sorne

38

reasons why it may be a worthwhile venture, although it allows that any decisive justification must perforce be retroactive. The second chapter introduces two main types of readings of Berlin, each with two main variants, in terms of which 1will treat the bulk of the criticalliterature on Berlin. The chapter begins by introducing an approach to understanding and organizing the different readings of Berlin (2.i). The following four sections briefly explore the two main readings and their variants. The first two sections offer liberal readings of Berlin: Berlin as a strong liberal or coId warrior (2.ii), and as a weak liberal (2.iii). The next two sections offer two pluralist accounts of Berlin: Berlin as a strong pluralist (2.iv), and as a relativist (2.v). The section concludes that while readings of Berlin differ sharply, they share certain concems (often for somewhat different reasons) with the inconsistency, underdevelopement and underdetermination of Berlin' s thought. The third, fourth and fifth chapters are devoted to thematic exploration of Berlin's texts. The third chapter develops the claim that Berlin can be best understood as a moderate but consistent historicist. It is argued that this approach both coheres with his texts, and helps to resolve the charge of inconsistency leveled against him. This analysis proceeds first through a discussion ofhistoricism in general (3.i), then to a more detailed examination ofhis particular moderate but consistent historicism (3.ii), and its central idea of sympathetic imagination (3.iii), and continues through a clarification of the contrasts between moderate and metaphysical historicism (3.iv), and an exploration ofhis use of quasi-universal and objective language (3.v), and finally ends with an exploration of moderate historicism within his philosophical and political thought (3.vi). The fourth chapter tums to an examination of the main contents of his moral and political thought, specifically his strong pluralism and his treatment of liberty. The first section (4.i) argues that Berlin quite deliberately embraces a distinctive variant of strong pluralism focused on a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate values. Berlin
argues for an agitated, uneasy equilibrium ofthese values as loose guidelines in public

life, to be flexibly applied to particular cases. This strong pluralism seems unconducive to any special privilege for negative liberty. It does, however, recognize pluralism itself not only as a descriptive aspect of the contemporary condition, but also as itself constituting an ultimate value. The second half of the chapter (4.ii) explores Berlin's

39

particular treatment ofliberty in general and of negative liberty in particular, and conc1udes in line with the first half of the chapter that Berlin reserves no special privilege or role for negative liberty in general. It is conc1uded that this reading of the substance of Berlin's political thought coheres well with his texts, and helps to answer the charge of underdevelopment which has been frequently leveled against him. Chapter 5 explores the linkages (and their resilience) between Berlin' s moderate but consistent historicism, outlined in chapter 3 and the content of his political thought as outlined in chapter 4, through the substance ofhis view ofhistoricized human nature. The substance of Berlin's view ofhistoricized human nature is laid out in 5.i. The arguments linking this view ofhuman nature to the precarious political equilibrium are explored in 5.ii, and the three lines of critique, the monist rejoinder (5.iii), a hermeneutical critique (5.iv) and the charge ofrelativism (5.v) are considered. The chapter conc1udes that Berlin's view ofhuman nature adequately supports the main elements of his political thought. Chapter 6 first elaborates, defends and consolidates Berlin's pluralist liberalism (6.i), and then compares and contrasts this pluralist liberalism with John Rawls political liberalism (6.ii). The first section addresses charges that pluralism and liberalism are either generally incompatible, or are incompatible in Berlin's particular formulation of them. It argues that Berlin defends a strong and coherent pluralist liberalism. The second half of the chapter argues that Berlin's and Rawls' liberalisms, indeed even their approaches to political thought are profoundly different, rivalrous and incompatible enough that Berlin's thought will look illiberal from Rawls' perspective and Rawls' will look rather uncivilized from Berlin's. 1 end the chapter by arguing that the sharp divergence between Berlin and Rawls illuminates two divergent strategies for the renewal of political thought in the face of profound moral and political pluralism, each of which deeply influenced a revival and tradition in political thought. While increased crossfcrtilization has profoundly blurred these distinctions in recent years, the excavation of

these two essential responses to pluralism provide a helpful framework for understanding tensions and debates today over the character of politicalliberalism and political thought in general.

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Notes

Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind (London: Pimlico, 1998), p. 77 and p. 59, respectively. 2 See, for example, Peter Laslett and W.G. Runcimann (ed.s), Philosophy and Society (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1964), p. vii and p. 1. This view was notably expounded by T.D. Weldon, as discussed in Michael H. Lessnoff, Political Philosophers ofthe Twentieth Century (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1999), p. 209; also see Peter Laslett (ed.), Philosophy, Politics and Society: A Collection (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1956), introduction; also see, Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 59 - 63. 3 for example, Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 61, 72 - 3, p. 89. 4 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 66 - 71. 5 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 69. 6 Ronald Dworkin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in Edna and Avishai Margalit (ed.s), Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration (London: The Hogarth Press, 1991), p. 100. 7 Alastair MacIntyre, After Virtue, (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1984), p. 1 - 5. 8 Also see Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity (London: John Murray, 1990), p. 176 - 7 and especially p. 179. Moreover, Berlin's "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century" is largely a development ofthis point focusing on 'histoiricism' as the primary catalyst of the collapse - Isaiah Berlin "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), especially p. 6 - 7 and p. 32. 9 Richard Rorty, "The Priority of Democracy to Philosophy," in Alan R. Malachowski (ed.), Reading Rorty: Critical Responses to Philosophy and the Mirror ofNature and Beyond (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1990), p. 287 - 8. 10 John Rawls, Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996), p. 4 7. II Ronald Dworkin, "Foundations of Liberal Equality," in Stephen Darwall (ed.), Equal Freedom: Selected Tanner Lectures on Human Values (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995), p. 233 - 8. 12 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), p. xiii - xvi. 13 Michael Ignatieff, l'Wiah Berlin: A Life (Toronto: Viking, 1998), p. 229. 14 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 261. 15 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 229. 16 C.l Galipeau, L'Wiah Berlin 's Liberalism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), p.
1 Isaiah

VUI. 17 C.J. Galipeau, p. 62. Also see, p. 3. The target of Berlin's critique is this monistic model, not moral judgement in general. As Berlin, and other scholars indicate, a monistic

41

model mns thoughout the ethical tradition form Plato and Aristotle to Hegel and Marx, and from Kant to, possibly, Rawls. (C.J. Galipeau, p. 67) 18 c.J. Galipeau, p. 67. 19 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), p. 149. 20 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 8. At the same time, it seems to me that the undermining oftraditionalliberalism by [Berlin's] value-pluralism also undermines the implicit model of a liberal state intimated in recent liberal political philosophy, as exemplified in the work of Rawls, Dworkin, Ackerman and their followers. (John Gray, "Agonistic Liberalism," in Enlightenment's Wake (London: Routledge, 1995), p. 74. The whole article develops this point, particular p. 74 - 80 elaborate this point). 21 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 61. 22 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 27. 23 For example, John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 57, (see also 187n,) 197, 198n, 303 4 (also see note 19), and p. 332. 24 Larry Krasnoff, "Consensus, Stability and Normativity in Rawls's Political Liberalism," The Journal ofPhilosophy, Volume XCV, Number 6 (June 1998), p. 2869 (quote from note # 15). 25 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 5. 26 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 148. 27 This point is argued to effect, for example, in C.J. Galipeau, p. 3 and p. 10, and in John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 101 - 3, and p. 107 - 8. 28 William A. Galston, "Value Pluralism and Liberal Political Theory," American Political Science Review, Volume 93, Number 4 (December 1999), p. 769. 29 At the very least we must add Galston himself, as well as sorne writers who have recently published important work on Berlin himself, including c.J. Galipeau, Michael Ignatieff, and Hans Blokland, Freedom and Culture in Western Society (London: Routledge, 1998). 30 Allen A. Buchanan, "Communitarian Critiques of Liberalism," Ethics, Volume 99, Issue 4 (July 1989), p. 853. 31 Onora O'Neill, "Ethical Reasoning and Ideological Pluralism," Ethics, Volume 98, Issue 4 (July 1988), p. 706. 32 For an excellent overview of the communitarian critique of liberalism, its strengths and ultimate deficiencies, see Ronald Beiner, What 's the Matter with Liberalism (London: Univesity ofCalifornia Press, 1992), p. 16 - 35. 33 Ronald Dworkin, "Liberal Community," in ShIomo Aveneri and Avner de-Shalit, ed.s, Communitarianism and Individualism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 205 226; Amy Guttman, "Communitarian Critics of Liberalism," Philosophy and Public Affairs, Volume 14 (1985), p. 315 - 6; Onora O'Neill, p. 707 - 8; also see Will Kymlicka, Liberalism, Community and Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989); also see Ronald Beiner, What 's the Matter with Liberalism, p. 18 - 22. 34 Daniel Bell, Communitarianism and its Critic (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993), p. 4 and p. 17n. 35 Will Kymlicka points with effect to the insensitivity ofboth communitarians and liberals to underlying conditions of pluralism, particularly cultural pluralism, in Will Kymlicka, Contemporary Political Philosophy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), p. 213 -

42

4. Beiner provides a good description of the difficulties communitarianism has in handling pluralism on What 's the Matter with Liberalism, p. 31. 36 Notably Will Kymlicka, Liberalism, Community and Culture (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989). 37 Allen A. Buchanan, p. 853, 856, 881 - 2; Onora O'Neill, p. 708; Allan Patten, "The Republican Critique of Liberalism," British Journal ofPolitical Science, Volume 26, Number 1 (1996), p. 36 - 44 (this latter portion of the article addresses sorne of Taylor's critiques of proceduralliberalism, but would have bite against points raised by MacIntyre and Sandel as well, for example); Amy Guttman, p. 314 - 5, 318 - 320. 38 Ronald Beiner makes this point to effect, Ronald Beiner, What 's the Matter with Liberalism, p. 30. 39 An excellent argumentative summary ofthis development can be found in John Gray, "Against the New Liberalism," Times Literary Supplement, July 3, 1992, p. 13 - 5. 40 Ronald Beiner, What's the Matter with Liberalism, p. 23. 41 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 101 - 3, and p. 107 - 8; and C.J. Galipeau, Isaiah Berlin 's Liberalism, p. 150 - 2, especially p. 152, p. 156 - 8, and p. 163. 42 Michael Walzer, "Introduction," in Isaiah Berlin, The Hedgehog and the Fox (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986), p. vii. 43 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 30. 44 C.l Galipeau, p. 1. 45 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," in Concepts and Categories (London: The Viking Press, 1979) and Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Philosophy Still Exist?" and "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, and "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality. 46 Karl Marx: His Life and Environment (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1970) or The Magus ofthe North: Jo. Hamann and the Origins ofModern Irrationalism (New York: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux). 47 For example, C.B. Macpherson's essay on "Berlin's Division of Liberty" in C.B. Macpherson, Democratie Theory: Essays in Retrieval (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973), is essential, I think, both as exposition and criticism. His distinctions among the various forrns of positive liberty comprehended in Berlin' s defintion sets the stage for the clarifications of perversible types offered by Woolcock and Gray - indeed, his PLs 1, 2 and 3 offer a rather richer framework then these more focussed developments. 48 also a number ofhelpful Berlin bibliographies: such as Isaiah Berlin, The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 642 - 3; also see C.J. Galipeau, p. 181 - 8. 49 Mark Lilla, Ronald Dworkin, Robert Silvers, The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin (New York: New York Review of Books, 2001); Robert Kocis, A Critical Appraisal ofIsaiah Berlin 's Political Philosophy (Lewisten, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 1989); Edna and Avishai Margalit (ed.s) l'laiah Berlin: A Celebration; and Alan Ryan (ed.), The Idea of Freedom: Essays in Honor ofIsaiah Berlin (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979). As Berlin himself published an article rather convincingly rejecting Kocis' reading as profoundly misreading his work, I will treat this as a supporting text of selective relevance rather than reflecting a main established reading. See Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis" Political Studies, Volume XXXI (1983), p. 388 - 93. 50 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 1.

43

51 Berlin himself exhibits ambivalence to the expression modernity (pre-modernity, postmodernity) - Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lsaiah Berlin, p. 61. He says that he doesn't know exactly what this means or where modernity begins or ends. As Jonny Steinberg argues to effect, references to modernity remain central to Berlin's texts and to his thought, and require a better accounting than this - Jonny Steinberg, "the Burden of Berlin's Modernity," History ofEuropean ideas, Volume 22, Number 5/6, p. 377 - 9. 1 would argue that Berlin's reticence simply reflects the difficulty in defining the boundaries of an epoch or culture from within. One can never be entirely sure until the thing is over. Nonetheless, Berlin does note a radical break, perhaps the most radical of aIl, in Western culture with the romantics, and this seems a reasonable starting place for analysis, and modernity represents the most familiar and convenient description of this period, even if the edges remain necessarily blurred. 52 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lsaiah Berlin, p. 29 - 30, and p. 46 - 7. 53 Thomas Nagel, The View from Nowhere (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986) 54 Isaiah Berlin, "Vico' s Concept of Knowledge," in Against the Current (London: The Hogarth Press, 1979), p. 113. 55 Aiso see Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in Concepts and Categories, p. 136 - 7, as weIl as Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind. 56 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 149 - 152. 57 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxiii. 58 Isaiah Berlin, "Historica1 Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 101, 107, 133 and p. 147. 59 which, with the recent advances in genetic techno10gy may themse1ves not be as absolute and unchangeab1e as was once be1ieved. 60 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," Salmagundi, Number 120 (FaIl 1998), p. 104 - 5; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 1xii; Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," The Journal of Value Inquiry, Volume 26 (1992), p. 559; and "The Sense of Rea1ity," in The Sense of Reality, p. 2 - 3, 18 - 9, and p. 34n. 61 Even a pure1y empirica1 account ofhuman nature would not eventuate in certainty. Moreover, it is not c1ear what a purely empirica1 account might look 1ike. The behaviorist (and positivist) mode1s in the social sciences seem 1arge1y discredited. In part, due to an inabi1ity to establish its frameworks as objective or universal, and in part due to a fai1ure to give a plausible account of the real complexity of human motivation andthought. 62 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15 - 6. 63 Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 81. 64 Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 113. 65 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lsaiah Berlin, p. 143 - 4. 66 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lsaiah Berlin, p. 143 - 4. 67 delivered in May 1979 to the Municipality of Jerusa1em. 68 Isaiah Berlin, "Three Strands in My Life," in The Jewish Quarterly, Volume 27, Numbers 2 and 3 (Summer/Autumn 1979), p. 5 - 8. 69 Isaiah Berlin, "Politica1 Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 5,8- 12 and p. 15, especiaIly p. 12. The potential internaI conflicts are perhaps given

44

most extensive discussion in terms of the liberal dilemma in his discussion of the life, work and liberalism of Turgenev - Isaiah Berlin, "Turgenev and the Liberal Predicament" in Fathers and Children (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), especial1y, p. 51 - 60. 70 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 256. 71 See Isaiah Berlin quoted in Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 246 (from letter to Jean Floud: 05:07:1968). 72 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 7. 73 Ramin Jahanbegloo, Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 45. 74 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 100. 75 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. fel xxxii.

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ln Ignatieffs interpretation, Berlin comforted himself with the thought that as an exponent of "liberal moderation," he was following the example of his beloved Ivan Turgenev, the great 19th Century Russian novelist who in his own day had incurred the disfavor both of the Left and the Right. Turgenev, says Ignatieff, was accused throughout his career of ingratiating himself with the authorities and revolutionaries alike, and of securing the trust of neither side. Even Herzen, who respected his literary genius, thought Turgenev an equivocating old maid in politics. 1 Norman Podhoretz, "A Dissent on Isaiah Berlin,,2

Chapter 2: Two Readings of Berlin 2.i. An Approach to the Readings of Berlin

This chapter is devoted to a review of the criticalliterature on Berlin. The literature on Berlin is extensive (and rapidly growing) - too extensive indeed for any comprehensive treatment here. The following review will of necessity be schematic, focusing on what appear to be the two most plausible and inf1uential general categories of interpretation. Beyond the challenge of its pure volume, however, the criticalliterature on Berlin presents further difficulties related to its character. In the remainder ofthis section, 1will consider his critical reception in general, and in so doing introduce what 1take to be the two further obstacles to brief1y encapsulating it. 1will then elaborate a basic strategy or approach to the readings of Berlin that will make it possible to overcome these difficulties. Employing this approach, 1will then lay out what 1take to be the two most generallines of interpretation. These two main lines will necessarily be somewhat abstract and programmatic 'ideal types' rather than specifie readings, but 1 will try to breathe sorne life into them by distinguishing sub-classes and connecting them with specifie readings, emphasizing the main interpreters 1 introduced in Chapter 1. An examination of the critical literature on Berlin reveals two immediately striking features. The first is that while there is ample praise for various features of Berlin's work, he did not seem to fully satisfy very many readers. Even his staunchest defenders seem somewhat reserved, carefully balancing their praise of this or that insight or achievement with criticism of sorne other feature ofhis work. LiberaIs, on the who le, have been apt to find Berlin not liberal enough, often accusing him of closet conservatism or socialism. 3 Conservatives, on the other hand, have tended to find him hopelessly radical, often even 'a spineless relativist.,4 ln Ignatieffs words, he was lia man

46

beset: disliked by the left, held in suspicion by the right. ,,5 Like his 'beloved Turgenev,' he seemed congenitally incapable of satisfying any of the main contending political factions ofhis time, or indeed ofbringing his thought into strict conformity with any fixed ideological position. Part of the problem seems to have been that Berlin, although self-avowedly liberal, was not consistent enough. He passionately advocated the primacy of different values and ideals in different cases, exasperating the more consistent advocates of the primacy of any particular value. Sometimes he was with them, sometimes not. 6 At any rate, he spent too much time trying to empathize and understand the different sides of a conflict, too much energy agonizing over fundamental conflicts to be of much use to firm partisans of one side or the other. He was thus frequently painted, like Turgenev, as 'an equivocating old maid in politics.' The criticalliterature reflects this basic fact - Berlin's thought does not seem to have found any proper home; he does not fit any of the well-established boxes into which we can traditionally pigeonwhole thinkers. The deeper one goes into the criticalliterature, the more equivocal, mixed, even confused, his reception seems. Many thinkers seem to want to draw on some idea or insight in Berlin's work, but few seem ready to embrace Berlin's work as a whole. This first point concerning what could be called the homelessness of Berlin's thought leads directly into a second, related point. The ultimate presuppositions or central cores which have been attributed to him have been very diverse. He has been characterized as a latter day Hume,7 Bentham,8 Weber,9 Hobbes, 10 Herder, II Mill, 12 ViCO,13 Herzen,14 as an unflinching doctrinaire negative rights liberal, 15 a . .. . . commumtanan, 16,post-mo d,17 a ratlOna1 18 an antl-ratlOna1 19 a new dea1 a ernlst lSt, lSt, liberal,2o as a conservative,21 a full-fledged relativist,22 a utilitarian,23 a positive liberty theorist,24 a libertarian,25 and an old-fashioned naturallaw theorist. 26 The difficulties associated with Berlin's failure to fit neatly into established positions in political thought are exacerbated by the extraordinary range of core positions that are attributed to him.
The very variety of the basic positions attributed to Berlin is reminiscent of the

opening section of Berlin's essay on "The Originality of Machiavelli," and the "sheer number of interpretations of Machiavelli's political thought"n that he encapsulates there. In that article, Berlin suggests a loose mIe of thumb concerning such dense clusters of diverse interpretation obscuring a political thinker:

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Whenever a thinker stirs passion, enthusiasm or indignation, or any kind of intense debate, it is generally the case that he has propounded a thesis which upsets sorne deeply established idee recue, a thesis which those who wish to ding to the old conviction nevertheless find it hard or impossible to dismiss or refute. This is the case with Plato, Hobbes, Rousseau, Marx. 1 should like to suggest that it is Machiavelli's juxtaposition ofthe two outlooks - the two incompatible moral views, as it were - in the minds of his readers, the collision and acute moral discomfort which folIow, that, over the years, has been responsible for the desperate efforts to interpret his doctrines away, to represent him as a cynical and therefore ultimately shallow defender of power politics, or as a diabolist, or as a patriot prescribing for particularly desperate situations which seldom arise, or as a mere time-server, or as an embittered political failure, or as nothing more than a mouthpiece of truths we have always known but did not like to utter ... or in any of the numerous other roles that have been and are still being cast for him. Machiavelli may have possessed sorne, at any rate, ofthese attributes, but concentration on one or other of them as constituting his essential, 'true' character seems to me to stern from re1uctance to face, still more discuss, the uncomfortable truth which Machiavelli had, unintentionalIy, almost casualIy, uncovered; namely, that not all ultimate values are necessarily compatible with one another. ... 28 If one were in the latter paragraph to replace the name 'Machiavelli' with 'Berlin', then one would have, 1think, a very apt description of Berlin and his critics and interpreters. Berlin possessed sorne, at any rate, of the beliefs and qualities his critics assign to him, but in overemphasizing these particular attributes, 1will argue that they miss, or avoid, the truly subversive synthesis which is his most important contribution to political thought. The criticalliterature on Berlin presents challenges then (1) in terms of its pure volume; (2) in terms of its failure to fit neatly into the established positions in political thought in terms ofwhich we are accustomed to speak; and (3) in terms of the wide range ofbasic outlooks or essential characters attributed to his writing. It is essential, then, in coming to grips with the criticalliterature, and ultimately Berlin's work, (a.) to darify the heart of Berlin's thought; (b.) to explain how his thought actually relates to the
established political positions, and particularly to liberalisrn; and (c.) to offer sorne

explanation of why so expansive a range of basic positions has been so widely and consistently attributed to him in the criticalliterature. Emphasizing the parallei between the critical reception of Berlin and Machiavelli's work suggests an answer to the last problem, and 1think begins to shed

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sorne light on the former two. Berlin sees the dualism implicit in Machiavelli's political writing, the juxtaposition oftwo deeply incompatible but plausible moral worlds as the birthplace of the idea ofpluralism in post-classical Western discourse and thought. This "profoundly upsetting conclusion,"29 which those who have corne after have found it 'hard or impossible to refute', helps to explain the wild diversity of interpretive efforts to explain his work away, even at the cost of distortion. One of Berlin's great interests, avowedly, is the exploration and development of this same idea of pluralism?O Sorne interpreters have even seen pluralism as his "idee maitresse.,,31 Could it not be then that this same 'uncomfortable truth,' or a modern variant of it, accounts, at least in part, for the desperate attempts to 'explain his doctrines away' - particularly when the diversity of readings is coupled with their generally negative tenor in regard of his overall position? 1want to suggest two basic things with this comparison: the first is simply that it need not be too disturbing or discreditable that my reading differs on sorne important points from each of the established readings, for existing readings already differ on many points, and no-one has yet offered a fully satisfactory and convincing portrait. As Berlin puts it in his article on Machiavelli, "where more than twenty interpretations already hold the field, the addition of one more cannot be deemed an impertinence.,,32 Indeed, the very diversity of interpretations itself presents an interesting puzzle. The second point is that this comparison suggests sorne reasons for widespread misunderstanding. First, monists characteristically misunderstand pluralists like Machiavelli and Berlin, because they insist on presuming monistic foundational standards - that foundations must be firm, absolute, cohesive, or they do not qualify as foundations at aIl. If one cannot or does not appeal to such hard foundations, one must be effectively bereft of foundations entirely. In the typical vocabulary of contemporary political discourse, one must be a relativist. A good deal of the argumentative thrust of Berlin's writing, however, is to challenge the force ofmonist presumptions. To interpret him in
light of such presumptions effectively prejudges his success and leads to ail sorts of

confusions. Second, critics may simply be uncomfortable with the full subversive implications of Berlin's strong pluralism. 1 suggest that this central idea in Berlin threatens to transform the basic frameworks in terms of which many of us have thought about politics. This may encourage misunderstanding.

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While 1 do not mean to suggest that pluralism is the only disturbing or challenging element in Berlin's thought, it is a very important one, and focusing on it, as weIl as on Berlin's commitment to politicalliberalism, allows us to begin to speak about sorne of the main types of interpretation of Berlin that have been offered. Focusing on these two issues - the depth and character of Berlin's pluralism, and the nature of his commitment to liberalism - provides a basis ofinquiry into the second main problem ofhow Berlin's thought relates to more established positions in political thought. At this point, however, 1think that it is important to draw attention to a point of which Berlin himself seemed to be acutely conscious: in drawing out and exploring a writer's political theory, it is not adequate to simply reconstruct the explicit structure of the theory. While this is an important matter, an exclusive emphasis on structure may be misleading. In understanding the structure of a writer's thought, we need to be guided by a sense of where the writer's ultimate commitment, his inspirational source or core, resides. An example may help to illuminate my point. In Berlin's case, if we focus on the structurallink between pluralism and liberalism, for example, we might distinguish between interpreters like John Gray, C.J. Galipeau, Michael Ignatieff, and George Crowder who see Berlin's idea ofpluralism alone grounding or justifying his concept of politicalliberalism, and interpreters like Daniel Weinstock and Charles Blattberg, who see Berlin' s commitments to both pluralism and liberalism as standing, at least in part, independently. This is an important distinction. Contrasting schematic structures by themselves, however, only takes us a short distance into understanding what these interpreters think is really important to Berlin and to us as contemporary readers. Overemphasis of the purely structural similarity threatens to obscure as much as it reveals. This point can be illustrated by considering the profound differences of orientation among the interpreters who draw a tight pluralist-liberallink. Ignatieff and Gray both think that Berlin's attempt to found politicalliberalism on moral pluralism fail. What is revealing is the different ways that each interpreter thinks Berlin would respond in the face of such difficulties. Ignatieff turns to the firm assertion of a strong liberalism and priority for negative liberty even if it must be bereft of any 'ultimate guarantee.' Gray, by contrast, portrays Berlin's failure as a serious setback for Berlin's liberal ambitions, in light of which Berlin would be forced to reconsider his commitment to

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traditionalliberalism, and perhaps to branch off into the development of a purely pluralist approach to political thought. While the different structures that interpreters attribute to Berlin's thought are important, we cannot properly appreciate how these interpreters understand Berlin until we grasp where they locate his "center of gravity." The brief introduction to the ultimate presuppositions suggests a basic classification of Berlin's interpreters into two camps - on one side, those who perceive in him ultimate ZiberaI presuppositions, and on the other, those who discover in him ultimate pluraZist presuppositions. The liberal readings center on a concept of negative liberty as the predominant political value, while the pluralist readings typically see selfcreation and pluralism as his dominant values. This classification provides sorne very basic orientation in confronting the diverse readings of Berlin, but also unfortunately tends to obscure the enormous diversity within the two camps. More ofthis underlying diversity can be captured by imagining Berlin's interpreters and critics across a spectrum ranging from an absolute liberalism at one pole to an absolute pluralism on the other. On this spectrum, it is easier to distinguish clearly between Ignatieff's strong liberal reading, for example, as closer to the liberal pole than Galipeau's weaker liberal account, while Gray's strong pluralist interpretation lies close to the pluralist pole, and Rorty's aosolute pluralist or relativist reading lies closer still. Organized in this way, it is possible to perceive groups of important readings loosely clustering around certain areas of the continuum, notably strong liberal, weak liberal, and strong pluralist points, with sorne important and interesting outliers. Focusing on a thinker's center of gravity in this way is a central feature of Berlin's own approach to political theory. Berlin himself is widely accounted by proponents and detractors alike 33 as something of a master of the skill of distilling another writer's 'center of gravity,' or in R.C. Collingwood's words, "the ultimate presuppositions" of a thinker. 34 As Ignatieffhas it, "He believed in striding right into the citadel of a thinker's assumptions, seizing the ruling concept and ignoring the earthworks of qualification and elaboration. ,,35 It is therefore neither surprising nor inappropriate that this approach should be so important in coming to grips with his own interpreters. In his essay on Mill, Berlin himself makes the point that writers' simple central convictions often get lost in the intricate structure and elaboration of their theories, and

51

that once illuminated, they, "as a mIe, turn out to be relatively simple and unsophisticated. ,,36 Berlin finds the uncovering of these deepest convictions an illuminating strategy in connection with Mill, and 1believe that something similar may be said about Berlin himself. In his introduction to recently published collection of Berlin's essays, Patrick Gardiner observes that Isaiah Berlin's writings have impinged on so many distinct spheres of thought and inquiry, and have ramified in such different and at times unexpected directions, that a question may be raised as to what leading conceptions have ultimately guided or held together his varied excursions into these apparently unrelated intellectual domains. 37 Here Gardiner aptly captures what was always the first question for Berlin, and must similarly be the first question in interpreting Berlin. Focusing on this central question allows us to (a.) sidestep many of the myriad controversies surrounding Berlin's thought and to (b.) concentrate on the essential question ofhow Berlin's thought relates to the familiar basic positions in political thought. Drawing his central conviction out in this way will help to (c.) illuminate why Berlin has been interpreted so diversely.

2.i Liberal Readings of Berlin

ln this section 1want to explore a little more closely the first, and best established type of interpretation of Berlin as ultimately committed to negative liberty and thus to liberalism. 1 willlay out what 1take to be the central features generally common to such interpretations, and then look more carefully at a few cases of the strong and weak readings, with emphasis on the readings offered by Ignatieff and Galipeau. The core claim of the liberal reading, and traditionally the predominant interpretation of Berlin, has been that (1) a substantial range of negative liberty is accorded a procedural priority on political questions. This priority is characteristically given the status of universal morallaw. (2) This primacy of negative liberty is generally seen as anchored (successfully or not) in a stable and enduring core ofhuman nature, and
sometimes a theory ofhuman historieal moral development. (3) Berlin is eorrespondingly

viewed as a critic of the idea of positive liberty in general, but particularly as exemplified in Marxist and fascist thought. The idea of democratic self-government, however, forms a partial exception to this harsh treatment, provided it is firmly regulated by a prior commitment to negative liberty. (4) The pluralist, historicist and romantic elements of

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Berlin's thought are correspondingly downgraded or interpreted weakly in relation to the defense of negative liberty, although they are generally recognized as original and noteworthy elements in his work. (5) The tragic themes connected with the collision of values and radical choices in Berlin's work is either de-emphasized in relation to negative liberty, or is given a restrained treatment only in terms of entailing 'irreparable loss' (instead of, say, 'doing irretrievable harm'). Liberal readings portray Berlin primarily, although not necessarily exclusively, as a defender of negative liberty. Even on strong liberal readings, other values, such as social justice, equality, public order, and democracy can place sorne basic restraints on the overriding value of negative liberty. It is primarily the extent of negative liberty which is allocated priority rather than the sharpness of its procedural privilege which distinguish strong from weak liberal readings. This distinction is really a matter of degree. Since, however, the issue is intimately bound up with Berlin's ultimate presuppositions, and the divergence can be significant, it warrants special attention here. Strong liberal readings of Berlin seek a steep privilege for an extensive value of negative liberty - in sorne cases even a 'maximal' range consistent with minimal social justice and arder. They correspondingly restrain other themes in Berlin's thought to make room for this extensive central commitment. Weak liberal readings, by contrast, narrow the primary claim of negative liberty to a core minimum, while continuing to acknowledge its sharp political predominance at least in relation to its primary claims. Similarly, the weak liberal readings characteristically attribute comparatively greater significance to the claims of positive liberty in general, as weIl as to the romantic pluralist, historicist and tragic themes in Berlin's thought, although they remain subordinate to the commitment to core negative liberty.

2.iii Berlin as a Strong Liberal

This strong liberal reading of Berlin seems to be the most widespread and
established Interpretation. Micheal Ignatieff cornes closest of the maj or i nterpreters to

this position. Like aIl interpreters of this liberal bent, Ignatieff insists that Berlin was committed to a firm procedural priority for negative liberty, both 'externally,' in relation to other political values like equality and justice, and internally, in relation to positive liberty. In terms of the 'external' priority ofnegative liberty, Ignatiefffirst emphasizes

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Berlin's originality in stressing that legitimate political values are deeply diverse and sometimes conflict irreconcilably, even the values at the heart of "the post-war [Western] democratic tradition," such as "equality, liberty and justice.,,38 In the face of an irreduceable plurality of legitimate political values, Ignatieff insists that Berlin defends a politicalliberalism anchored in a strong primacy for negative liberty as the best guarantee of free public discourse and a maximum range of individual choice: "Negative liberty was the core of a properly liberal creed: leaving individuals alone to do what they want, provided their actions did not interfere with the liberty of others.,,39 Where political values conflicted, negative liberty was to be accorded a clear procedural primacy: "If values were in conflict, then liberalism's priority was procedural. A regime ofnegative

freedom was the best guarantee of the public discussion of choices that a free sociallife
required;,,40 [ia] "Liberty ought to have a certain priority....,,41 Two points here warrant particular attention. Although (1.) Ignatieff sees Berlin placing strong procedural priority on negative liberty, this priority is not unlimited. A certain amount of negative liberty should still be traded-offto provide adequate room for the strongest claims of other legitimate political values, such as equality and justice. 42 Nonetheless, (2.) what Ignatieff sees Berlin defending remains finally 'a regime ofnegative liberty,' in which individuals 'do what they want, provided their actions do not interfere with the liberty of others. ,43 On Ignatieff s reading of Berlin, this basic liberal position is elevated to the status of a 'universal morallaw': "Variety, including moral variety, was built into the constitution ofhumankind. Such differences ... were entitled to respect and should be guaranteed by a regime ofliberty.,,44 The fact that Ignatieffrefers to liberty in general here should not be misunderstood, however, as admitting a degree of positive liberty: for Berlin" ... the facts of human nature permit sufficient agreement to guarantee the

conditions ofnegative liberty: freedom from; but not sufficient agreement to justify
collective pursuit of sorne ideal: freedom to. ,,45 For Ignatieff, the foundation of negative
liberty's priority is a universal account ofhuman nature, and this foundation is buttressed

by the 2th century experiences of revulsion at violations of the morallaw on a mass scale: Berlin "deeply believed that the concentration camps offered the most conclusive justification ever for accepting the necessity of a universal morallaw.,,46 Negative liberty offers a protection against human degradation that positive liberty does not. Indeed, both

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the holocaust and the Stalinist purges were carried out in the name of positive liberty, or at least perverse forms of it. Ignatieff describes Berlin's "polemic against positive liberty" as follows: This was the 'strange reversaI' to which the doctrine of 'positive liberty' 'freedom to' - was fatally prone: to begin with an ideal of freedom as selfmastery and to end with the dictatorship of the proletariat and Stalin's engineers of 47 human souls. l want to emphasize, moreover, that Ignatieff does not recognize any distinction between different types of positive liberty here,48 such as monistic or pluralistic, or as between a demand for say national self-determination, a worker's revolution, Lebensraum, or for democratic self-government. As Ignatieff himself allows, Berlin casts a very wide net with positive liberty.49 AlI ofthese forms of positive liberty are treated by Ignatieff as similarly ''fatally prone" to this "strange reversal." There is, however, one important and obvious limitation on Ignatieffs account of Berlin's hostility to positive liberty, although Ignatiefftends not to specifically distinguish it in his general discussions of positive liberty. Under the proper conditions, when firmly regulated by a prior value ofnegative liberty, democratic self-government can represent a valuable and legitimate form of government. Where democracies were not constitutionally committed to the defense of negative liberty, however, then liberals might find themselves battling the majority: The lecture was a strong defence of the liberty of the individual, rather than a defence of democratic government as such. Democratie self-government 'on the whole provide(s) a better guarantee' ofnegative liberty, but only 'on the whole.' A liberal might have to defend the liberty (of, say, a minority) against a democratic tyranny. Such a conflict of values was intrinsic to modern politicallife. 5o For Ignatieffs Berlin, negative liberty had priority. A liberal-democracy derived its value then in instrumentally conducing better than the alternatives to the reproduction of negative liberty. Its value was then highest where the universal morallaw was afforded special protection. Ignatieff suggests that Berlin's attitude remained "skeptical... towards democracy and political participation" per se. 51 Nonetheless, for Ignatieffthis type ofliberalism is the hard core, the center of gravity or the backbone of Berlin's thought, a liberalism which takes the form of a tight embrace of negative liberty in general, and which rejects, or at least sharply subordinates,
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the corresponding claims of positive liberty in general: "His [Berlin's] liberal theory is intransigent in... its commitment to negative rather than positive liberty."52 Negative and positive liberty will clash, and when they do, Berlin's liberalism dictates that the positive claims be rejected in favor of the negative. The ultimate baseline argument here is generally believed to be, as Ignatieff indicates, that human nature is supposed to support a general privilege for negative liberty which forms the core of liberalism: Berlin's commitment to liberalism is therefore absolute, universal and immovable. Ignatieff insists that after the 'infamous' events of the first half of the twentieth century, The human race had at last performed all the experiments: it was no longer possible to deny that mankind must either respect the universality of the species or perish altogether. 53 Ignatieff thus insists that Berlin views the very survival of the species as contingent upon compliance with the revealed universal morallaw. On inspection, however, Ignatieff admits that Berlin does not fully redeem the check he draws on human nature. When Berlin takes up the question of the content of universal human nature in detail, he offers only the sparsest account: His list was bare and to the point: there is such a thing as human nature, for we all share the same 'physical, physiological and nervous structure', the same body, the same capacity to feel pain. Moreover, we are moral beings: we would not quaIify as human if moral considerations, however false or inadequate, were absent from our deliberations. And from this common ground - of a shared body and a shared language of moral discourse - we know the inhuman when we encounter it. 54 Moreover, "Apart from these fragmentary suggestions," Ignatieff insists that, "he never explored further how faith in moral universals might be strengthened. ,,55 Yet nothing in this sparse account seems to necessitate the elevation of negative liberty in general to the status of a universal and sacred good, at least not without a great deal of further
development. Moreover, Ignatieff cuts off any recourse to teleological or developmental

arguments beyond the bare facts ofhuman nature referred to above: "Berlin's central objective was to separate a defence ofliberty from any claim that it had an emancipating or improving effect on human nature.,,56 However, rejecting this line of defense appears to leave Berlin' s political commitments underdetermined. Ignatieff is thus forced to

56

conclude that "Isaiah did not explain why negative liberty should have priority over other political values. ,,57 Ignatieff argues that Berlin ultimately simply dismissed the importance of providing adequate justification or explanation for his core commitments or to establish the close coherence of his thought: Indeed, the only defence he [Berlin] offered ofliberty's priority in politics was in terms of pluralism. If values were in conflict, then liberty's priority was procedural.... But this left the justification of liberty trapped in a circle: freedom was required to make freedom possible. He never professed to be bothered by his own failure to ground the defence of liberty on ultimate principles. He tartly suggested that secular rationalists who sought unassailable political principles were succumbing, without realizing it, to nostalgia for the kinds of consolation once offered by religious faith. Berlin dismissed the very idea of seeking ultimate 58 guarantees at aU. Beyond the circularity of the pluralist-liberallinkage, Ignatieffpoints to the argument made by Gray and others that the attempt to ground liberalism on pluralism is deeply flawed. The pluralist 10gicaUy cannot put liberty first among values, particularly on a universal scale, as a moral or naturallaw. If pluralism is the prior consideration here, as either a fact or value, why should the forms of life favored by a civic humanist, or as Gray develops, a particularist iUiberal, necessarily be a less valid form of life or ideal than a liberal who sharply privileges negative liberty?59 Nonetheless, on Ignatieffs reading, Berlin retained the unshakeable conviction that 'if values were in conflict, then liberty's priority was procedural,' that negative liberty provides an 'unassailable political principle,' foundation or no foundation. This leaves Berlin in the position of largely preaching to the converted. On Ignatieff s reading he has no ready answer for those who deny the universal morallaw. 6o Indeed, it is not clear on this account how Berlin can defend either the underlying pluralism of the human condition, or, even if descriptively accurate, that the plural condition has value worthy of preserving. On the other hand, in light ofhis loose construction of Berlin's framework ofjustification, Ignatieffis free to give a good deal ofindependent development to each of Berlin's major themes without undue concem about how these can be fit together. Ignatieffs 100se construction of Berlin's central theme aUows him to invest a great deal ofinterpretive energy in the tragic facet of Berlin's thought,6\ more indeed than

57

might be expected from such a strong liberal reading of Berlin. Despite his acknowledgment oftragedy's centrality to Berlin's thought, however, the tragic theme remains, as expected, removed from the basic value of negative liberty. Ignatieff, moreover, sees the looseness in Berlin's key themes manifested in sorne very important ambiguities in the practical connotations of his work: 'Two Concepts of Liberty" made it clear what liberalism stood against. But it was less clear about what liberalism was for - that is, how much social justice was compatible with negative liberty, indeed how muchjustice was required. The polemic against positive liberty carried Berlin away from these questions and left his commitments to social justice unspecified. 62 Here Ignatieff complains that Berlin failed to substantially address the question of how much social justice was 'compatible with' the firm priority he attributes to negative liberty. He then suggests that the real question might be how much social justice was 'required, suggesting that sorne minimum of social justice should actually (in Berlin's opinion, presumably) define an extreme limit to the priority of negative liberty - but this is exactly what he is complaining is missing in Berlin's thought. In Ignatieffs opinion, then, Berlin's thought was underdeveloped to the degree that it failed to constrain negative liberty. Ignatieffs approach to Berlin's work then leads us to the acknowledgment of both serious foundational and practical underdevelopment in terms of Berlin's treatment of negative liberty and its limits, and underdetermination in its ground ofjustification in human nature. Nonetheless, if the desired prooffrom the base ofhuman nature was not forthcoming, and the justification ran into circles, so that liberty presumed pluralism and pluralism presumed liberty, it was no matter. For Ignatieff, Berlin's liberalism, grounded in the universal moral primacy ofnegative liberty, was 'unyielding.'63 It represents his ultimate presupposition. Regardless of the difficulties incurred by this type ofreading, and the plausible
alternatives which have appeared in recent years, it remains, 1 think, the dominant or

mainstream reading of Berlin. Berlin is presented as defending a very strong a priori doctrine focused on negative liberty. In essence, Berlin is viewed as a negative libertarian (at least up to the point of an undefined minimal social justice) who sought to unmask and discredit the idea of positive liberty. This 'cold warrior' construction of

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Berlin's thought is by no means limited to Ignatieff. 64 Because 1want to daim that this has been the dominant interpretation of Berlin's thought in mainstream Anglo-American discourse, 1 will pause to introduce a number of prominent political thinkers who concur with Ignatieff on this important point, before returning to complete the brief exposition of his position. For the moment 1will restrict myselfto very firm, categorical cases ofthese claims - the claims that Berlin offers an 'absolute' or 'a priori' defense of maximalist negative liberty and a corresponding general repudiation of positive liberty. Leo Strauss offers a classic example of the absolute libertarian reading of Berlin: The freedom that Berlin cherishes is the negative freedom for 'our poor, desireridden, passionate, empirical selves': "a maximum degree of non-interference compatible with a minimum degree of sociallife, or the "freedom to live as one prefers." He seems to cherish that freedom as "an end in itself' or "an ultimate value." These frontiers must be "sacred." They must be "absolute" .... the demand for the sacredness of a private sphere needs a basis, an "absolute" basis. 65 ln Strauss' reading then, Berlin asserts a very strong priority for negative liberty, such that it trumps all competing claims save the absolute prerequisites of the most minimum sociallife. This absolute priority, of course, requires sorne kind of absolute, secure foundation, but, Strauss maintains, no such foundation appears in Berlin's work. 66 Roger Hausheer advances a very similar claim emphasizing the prioritization of a maximum of 'freedom from interference consonant with basic social order:' ln addition to all the standard liberal arguments for individualliberty, he [i.e., Berlin] urges that there is one supreme consideration which confers a unique status on 'negative' liberty, the freedom to act without outside interference .... Therefore the maximum freedom from interference consonant with basic social order and justice is most likely to promote human flourishing and avoid frustration and suffering. Hence Berlin's eloquent plea for negative liberty. Hence, too, his cautionary words against the 'positive' liberty of self-mastery... " 67 [ia] Hausheer, like Strauss, connects Berlin with a maximalist tradition of negative libertarians, allowing exceptions only as "consonant with basic social order. ... " Again,
Berlin is reprcsentcd as deeply hostile to, and skeptical of, positive liberty. On

Hausheer's reading, the core of Berlin's political theory is a "supreme consideration" which imposes "a unique status on 'negative' liberty." The "supreme consideration" is believed to be so powerful that it preemptively excludes any countervailing consideration short of the reproduction of the 'basic social order and justice.'68

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Quentin Skinner's interesting article, "The Idea of Negative Liberty: Philosophical and Historical Perspectives" deals centrally with Berlin's political thought, but treats his thought as emblematic of the entire English negative-libertarian tradition. Skinner represents Berlin's commitment to negative liberty in the following terms: "to cite the formula originally owed to Jeremy Bentham, and more recently made famous by Isaiah Berlin - the concept of liberty is essentially a 'negative' one.,,69 The essence of Berlin's position (and the dominant position among English-speaking political theorists) is "that the only coherent idea of liberty is the negative one ofbeing unconstrained.,,70 Skinner provides an example of what might be called a Benthamite reading of Berlin, which portrays Berlin as predominantly concerned with clarifying the claims ofnegative liberty, which alone are considered legitimate and which are presumed to trump other claims. This is not of course because Skinner shares this Benthamite position, but because he wants to criticize it, and Berlin through it. By the same token, Skinner sees Berlin as opposed to positive liberty: Isaiah Berlin remarks ... that to speak of rendering myself free by virtuously performing my social duties, thereby equating dutYwith interest, is simply to "throw a metaphysical blanket over either self-deceit or deliberate hypocrisy." This appears to be Berlin's own view. 7\ On Skinner's reading, Berlin regards claims of positive liberty as incoherent, if not inthemselves then in-so-far as they are inherently incompatible with our deepest commitments. The main thesis of Skinner's article, contrary to these views he attributes to Berlin, is that it is both possible and coherent to affirm positive and negative liberty from sorne theoretical perspectives. Skinner illustrates his case by showing how Machiavelli's political thought exemplifies such a dualistic position. 72 Skinner's essay relies on the contrast between this Machiavellian dualism and Berlin's Benthamite obsession with negative liberty. Another Benthamite reading of Berlin is offered by Charles Taylor in his "What's Wrong with Negative Liberty?" Taylor classifies Berlin among those who "want to define freedom exclusively in terms of the independence of the individual from interference by others,"73 or, in other words, who want to define liberty exclusively in the negative: "The only clear meaning that can be given to freedom is the absence of

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externalobstacles.,,74 Taylor focuses his criticism on this tough-minded exclusive emphasis and priority on negative liberty. He sees Bentham and Hobbes as major exemplars ofthis tough-minded negative-libertarianism, and lines Berlin up with this "Hobbes-Bentham view.,,75

c.B. Macpherson powerfully attacked Berlin's idea of freedom not at its border
with positive variants, but at the point ofBerlin's sharp "distinction between freedom and the conditions of freedom." The point of Macpherson's critique, however, is to reveal the inadequacy of Berlin's absolute and exclusive (maximalist) commitment to a narrow conception of negative liberty. Macpherson writes, This [i.e., Berlin's position] is to acknowledge the importance of class oppression (which falls into the category of deprivation of access to the means of life and labor) only to put it aside as being a diminution of the conditions for liberty, not of liberty. But this distinction is meaningful only when liberty has already been defined so narrowly.... we are back to the same difficulty as before: his negative liberty does not include access to the means oflife and the means oflabor, in spite of the fact that lack of access does diminish negative liberty, that is, does diminish the area in which a man cannot be interfered with. To omit lack of access from the category of coercive impediments to liberty ... seems to me an unfortunate reversion towards the extreme liberalism of Herbert Spencer. 76 At the end ofthis latter paragraph, Macpherson further connects Berlin's liberalism, and his concept of liberty in particular, with the libertarianism of Milton Friedman. In fairness, he is later forced to allow that Berlin is clearly not opposed to the welfare state, nor government regulation of the economy (Berlin was, for example, a defender of Roosevelt's New Deal
77 )

but on Macpherson's reading this does not betoken a general

concession to positive liberty or equality at all. Berlin, rather, elaborates a sort ofwelfare justification out ofhis exclusive commitment to an extremely narrow conception of negative liberty. For Macpherson, however, such a strictly negative conception of liberty is "wholly inadequate basis for a general emancipation, and serves, in effect, to perpetuate class division and coercion under a veneer of enlightenment." Again, the strict focus on negative liberty echoes Hobbes and Bentham. 78 Moreover, Macpherson insists that Berlin's description of positive liberty tries to pile too much into a single concept, and as a consequence ends up obscuring much that is valuable, and, at worst, presenting a

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crude and unattractive caricature of positive liberty 79 quite worthy of Berlin's general " repudlatlOn. so ln the work of Robert Kocis, a prolific interpreter of Berlin, the claim of negative liberty is taken to be explicitly "a prioristic,,,Sl and should therefore automatically supersede competing claims, particularly those grounded in positive liberty: "Negative liberty is the ideal of the liberal tradition which Berlin is defending."S2 Intrusion into this realm [of negative liberty] is a violation of the person, denying human purposiveness, The sense of liberty emphasizes protecting individuals in their choices and requires maintaining the inviolability ofpersons. 83 Kocis argues that Berlin sees aH theories of positive liberty as perversely rationalistic or at least as susceptible of degeneration into perverse rationalistic forms. Kocis therefore sees Berlin as arguing for an exclusive a priori privilege for negative liberty, and issuing a blanket condemnation of positive liberty. Ignatieff then is by no means alone in taking this to be Berlin's position, indeed his central contention. The view of Berlin as defending the absolute priority of a maximal, or at least robust, negative liberty is widespread. The attitude ofthese interpreters to the whole romantic strain in Berlin's thought is captured, 1think, in a remark that Ignatieff quotes concerning Berlin's romanticism: Larry Siedentop, a one-time pupil of Berlin, remarked that his teacher liked to venture into the romantic irrational by day, but always returned to the Enlightenment by nightfall. 84 ln other words, when push came to shove Berlin quickly deserted, or at least radically subordinated, his romantic flirtation, and returned to his domestic duties and obligations in the house of the Enlightenment. In Ignatieffs view, The Romantics bequeathed the tyranny of identity politics .... It is significant that an expatriate who had to forge an identity for himself should have been so skeptical about romantic self-creation as an ideal. Self-creation might be innocuous, occasionally noble, in conditions offreedom, but in the hands of a
Napoleon or a Hitler, it could degenerate into a justification for molding human

clay into instruments of their own diabolical will. 85 [ia] Berlin is presented as "so skeptical" about 'romantic self-creation' that he only sees it as either 'innocuous," or even in some sense possibly "noble" when it is firmly regulated by prior "conditions offreedom," otherwise it is an invitation to tyranny. Of course, despite

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Berlin's purported skepticism conceming romantic values, Ignatieff allows that both the pluralistic and tragic themes emerge out of an understanding of romanticism: After Herder, European culture embraced toleration as the recognition of the plurality oftruth and value, Added to this, the Romantics introduced the idea that cultural variety was in itself a good thing. Sincerity, authenticity, toleration and variety - these new values formed the presuppositions ofmodern liberal individuaUsm. Moreover, the Romantic conception oftragedy transformed modern poUlies. Until the Romantics, it was believed that tragedy arose from error or human fallibility. But in the world revealed by the Romantic, tragedy was unavoidable: men were bound to disagree about the ultimate ends of life; these ends themselves were in conflict. Not aIl good things could be had at once. Conflict of values and tragic loss were unavoidable. 86 [ia] Berlin's attitude on this reading, however, remains deeply skeptical towards romanticism, for while he wants to embrace these romantic values of sincerity, authenticity, toleration, and variety and particularly the ideas ofpluralism and tragedy, he is only willing to do so on an unassailable assurance of a regime of negative liberty. In sum then, strong liberal readings generally portray Berlin (1) as investing overriding authority in an extensive conception of negative liberty, up to a rather illdefined point of essential social justice or order; (2) as attempting at least to uncover an absolute foundation for this, characteristically in human nature or moral development; (3) as generally subordinating romantic, pluralist and tragic themes to the prior role of negative liberty, and (4) as hostile and skeptical towards daims for positive liberty, with the exception of democratic principles firmly regulated by a prior commitment to negative liberty. This reading, however, concedes serious underdevelopment and underdetermination in Berlin's thought, particularly political.

2.iv Berlin as a Weak Liberal

A more recent set of liberal readings depict Berlin as attempting to harmonize or balance his commitments to liberalism with a more substantial, although still subordinate pluralism. Here, Berlin is seen first as a weak liberal, and secondly as a "limited" or "restricted" pluralist87 who seeks to balance his pluralism with an entrenched universal morallaw requiring at least a bare minimum of liberal values and rights, especially a minimum ofnegative liberty. The key point l want to calI to attention regarding these readings is that they argue that Berlin's center of gravity encompasses a sharp privilege for a relatively narrow core
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of negative liberty. This privilege is grounded on a universal view of human nature and a cumulative view of moral progress. This narrowing of the presumptive claim ofnegative liberty allows a somewhat greater scope for the romantic themes in Berlin's work, as weIl as for a more significant role for positive liberty. In recent years, this view has won many articulate adherents, and has established itself as an important rival to the traditional view even in very mainstream discussions of Berlin. Of the main readings, Galipeau's best reflects this emergent weak liberal view of Berlin's political thought. In sharp contrast, for example, to Ignatieff s account of Berlin' s liberalism, which "tartly" shrugs off the need for a clear account ofwhy negative liberty enjoys priority in morallife, Galipeau makes a heroic effort to elicit a substantial framework ofjustification out of Berlin's work. His strategy involves focusing primarily on only the core of negative liberty, and taking a dualistic view of Berlin's treatment ofhuman nature. The first aspect ofthis treatment ofhuman nature involves an expansive "ethical naturalist" account of common human nature. 88 A naturalist position involves claims about what inheres in human nature as such, what is innate. An ethical naturalist account then attributes ethical qualities or needs to man as such - man is by nature good, for example, or bad, or requires freedom or membership in a community. Galipeau's account of Berlin's common human nature is strikingly richer than Ignatieffs. Galipeau sees Berlin propounding a theory of "universal characteristics of human life,,,89 including basic categories of experience, capacities and a "set of core values,,,9o including "justice, compassion, mercy, strength, liberty, equality, and the like.,,91 This naturalist account of common human nature is supplemented by a dynamic, historicist one - "a model that he believes is better suited to our sense of human beings as free agents living within unique cultures and historical societies....,,92 This historicist human nature accounts for changes in human values and differences between human cultures and historical periods. Although Galipeau admits that the coexistence of these
two accounts ofhuman nature is somewhat counter-intuitive, he insists that "while there

is tension here, there is no contradiction. ,,93 Galipeau argues that the two accounts of human nature can be harmonized to jointly support Berlin's political commitments. In particular, he argues that Berlin's

naturalist account of human nature supports "a minimum content theory of naturallaw

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that includes [negative] liberty as a foundational value.,,94 [ia] Indeed, in general "negative liberty is taken to be prior to other goods,,,95 although at the level of universal morallaw this priority is limited to its core. Nonetheless, Galipeau insists that the universallaw, grounded in the universal account of human nature, represents the "touchstone" or core of Berlin's thought. At its heart, Berlin's view is committed to "the moral unity of the human species," and more specificaIly "moral claims based on universal values," "etemal axioms," or "overarching standards of morality.,,96 Other articulate interpreters, such as Daniel Weinstock, have recently taken up this reading of Berlin as defending a universal "minimum area of personal freedom" embedded in the

"the essence ofhuman nature,,,97 [ia] which acts as a universal basic constraint on the
range of moral and political pluralism. 98 Galipeau similarly conceives this hard kemel of truth in Berlin which limits the range of pluralism: Hence there are limits to the pluralism of values. Moreover, Berlin believes in the existence of a common core of values, the 'empirica1. .. kemel of truth in the old a priori naturallaw doctrines..99 On the weak liberal reading it is this hard core ofnegative liberty that marks Berlin's ultimate presupposition. On Galipeau's reading, when the historicist account ofhuman nature is added to the naturalist, together they provide the grounds to justify the foIlowing five key components ofliberalism: [1] "liberal-democratic practice, including [2] the respect and preservation of moral pluralism and [3] a large amount of personalliberty."loo Galipeau also suggests that Berlin "recognizes the importance of other values such as [4] equality and [5] social justice, and [he] argues for them, especiaIly to make a society decent, just and tolerable for aIl .... [He insists that] a working compromise ... must be struck between these values."IOI Galipeau's dualistic theory ofhuman nature seems to present, at least initiaIly, a common, stable, naturalistic center ofhuman universals with adynamie, culturaIly variant periphery. The naturalist theory at the core provides a special status for the core of negative liberty and a lesser status for other universal values, while the dynamic aspect "justifies most ofwhat occurs in actual political societies."I02 The introduction of the historicist account of human nature, as weIl as the submission of a

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wider range of negative liberty to the possibility of radical conflict, reflect the increased importance of the romantic heritage on weak liberal readings in comparison to strong. While this represents an engaging and in many respects attractive interpretation of Berlin's view, 1 want to suggest that the tensions produced by this dual construction run far deeper that Galipeau acknowledges, and lead to serious difficulties in Berlin's thought, ultimately reproducing much of the same condition of underdevelopment that plagues Ignatieff s account. Indeed, Galipeau himself conc1udes, The weakness of Berlin's work is due to the fact that he never worked out the limits of pluralism, or the preferred balance between negative and positive liberties, or what is part of the common core of human values and what is not. Instead he points out the difficulty in making these kinds of measurements and comparisons. He offers only the prescription to make workable trade-otIs when values conflict. Consequently, his contribution remains underdeveloped. 103 [ia] Weinstock again concurs, characterizing Berlin's thought as retreating from normative political philosophy and offering an invitation to philosophize rather than philosophy itself. 104 Like Ignatieff, Galipeau points in particular to Berlin's failure to work out the limits of pluralism, and in particular how far it is to be constrained by the universal priority of negative liberty, as weIl as to the ambiguities in his treatment of human nature as major sources of underdevelopment. What 1 want to suggest in the remainder of this section is that Galipeau also acknowledges, although more subtly, an important degree of underdetermination and inconsistency in Berlin's work. These difficulties emerge primarily around the idea of a naturalist account of human nature in Berlin and the idea of a minimal doctrine of naturallaw that this supports. Before turning to the specifie difficulties which arise on this line of interpretation, it is worth noting that Berlin at no point explicitly embraces any doctrine of naturallaw. He writes that there is an empirical kernel oftruth in the old doctrines ofnaturallaw, but he also finds a kernel oftruth in existentialism as weIl as in the work of Marx and Hamann, for example, and this makes him neither an existentialist, a Marxist nor a romantic irrationalist. If Berlin does not need then to be read in terms of a doctrine of naturallaw, is it helpful to do so? In the first place, although Galipeau maintains that Berlin's defense of politicalliberalism rest ultimately on an idea ofhuman nature,10S he is also very c1ear that Berlin offers a thoroughgoing critique of the traditional idea of a "fixed and unalterable

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human nature," 1 as well as of a priori, teleological, metaphysical and evolutionary 06 107 Such accounts clash with Berlin's empiricism and threaten, in Berlin's accounts. words, to force our understanding into a Procrustean bed oftheory. Nonetheless, a naturalist view ofhuman nature seems to imply sorne fixed account ofhuman nature. One strategy Galipeau employs to avoid involving Berlin in a self-contradiction is an insistence that, although ethical naturalism and naturallaw doctrines are characteristically based on fixed a priori metaphysical or teleological models, Berlin's own doctrine "is thoroughlyempirical.,,108 It is by no means clear, however, that thorough empiricism can provide an adequate foundation for an ethical naturalist account of human nature or a universal morallaw. Accepting the idea of an ethical naturalist position grounded in thoroughgoing empiricism leads into troubling territory, including two distinct fallacies of naturalism. If the naturalistic view ofhuman nature is on the one hand thoroughly empirically grounded and on the other sustains a universal morallaw, then it marks an argumentative transition from empirical observation to categorical normativity. In the first place, however, even if sorne value or ethical characteristic, for example, were found in sorne way to be demonstrably present in all human cases, this would not establish its strict necessity - it would not logically demonstrate that the common feature must be innate or stable - for empirical demonstration always remains open to falsification by the next case. Empirical continuity may extend tentative credibility, but this seems a dubious foundation for a universal natural morallaw. To assume that empirical evidence is sufficient to definitively establish necessary qualities ofhuman nature is to commit a fallacy of epistemological naturalism. Indeed, to the degree that Berlin limits his claims, as we will see, to most people and most times and most places, he points to cases which effectively disprove the strict naturalist thesis. On the other hand, even if one were to accept the naturalist claim that features
which exhibit a high degree of empirical regularity were in fact necessarily innate, this

would still not adequately support normative inferences, and particularly not so ambitious a claim as universal morallaw. It commits what could be called a fallacy of moral naturalism, of deriving normative claims from empirical ones, ought from is. 109 In essence, the whole linkage from empirical observations through ethical naturalism to

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morallaw, seems fraught with difficulties that Berlin never attempts to treat. This perhaps explains why naturalist views, and naturallaw doctrines, are characteristically a priori and not empirical views. Galipeau allows in a footnote that reading Berlin in this way seems inevitably to open him up to charges offalling into a naturalistic fallacy.110 ln essence, the derivation of universal naturallaw, even of a minimal doctrine, seems critically underdetermined in Berlin's work. Another dilemma seems to arise at this point which Galipeau appears to implicitly acknowledge with his concerns about what is and is not included in common human nature. In essence, it is not clear why negative liberty, which is only one component of what Galipeau treats as a very rich and varied conception of common human nature, becomes the subject of a naturallaw while other human universals do not, or at least not to the same extent. Again, this move seems underdetermined or at least unexplained. Moreover, the moment that Berlin's thoroughgoing empiricism slips over into an ethical naturalism, it seems to involve a claim about fixed features ofhuman nature, however loosely justified, which threatens to open Berlin to his own critique offixed views of human nature. In other words, it involves him in a degree of internaI inconsistency. The second difficulty with the ethical naturalist reading emanates from its specific content. The main content of Galipeau' s universal doctrine of naturallaw is a minimum of negative liberty. Negative liberty is taken on Galipeau's account as a "conceptual tag for civilliberties," and a core of negative liberty seems to refer to core of basic civilliberties. Galipeau emphasizes freedom of expression and association, for example. A problem, however, arises here because Berlin argues forcefully, as Galipeau acknowledges in a later section, that value of negative liberty is a distinctively modern Western invention: III "an historical growth, an area bounded by frontiers.,,112 As Berlin has it elsewhere, "the sense ofprivacy itself, of the area ofpersonal relationships as something sacred in its own right, derives from a conception of freedom which, for aIl its religious roots, is scarcely older
than the Renaissance or the Reformation." 113 If negative liberty is a value whieh Berlin

views as ultimate, at least among others, then how can he be defending it except as an ideal embedded in the expressive whole of Western society? Ifthis is the case, however, how can negative liberty be the basis of a universal morallaw? ln answering this question, Galipeau tells us, "Berlin's historicism is crucial to his

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argument.,,114 It is in his chapter on Berlin and French liberalism, outlining his historicist thought, that Galipeau argues that "sorne political values will retreat in importance, while others become primary. This seems to be the case with negative and positive liberty." 115 It is only in light ofthis historical development that Galipeau is able to conc1ude that "Negative liberty... must be represented in any contemporary society, ifthat society is to be called free and decent.,,116 The consequence is that Galipeau is forced to rely for the justification of the minimum content ofuniversal naturallaw on the dynamic or historicist account of human nature. The universal morallaw is the outcome, at least in part, of 'a narrative about the fate of conceptions of liberty in Western history.,,117 This shift of emphasis, however, has the effect of destroying the neat picture detailed earlier of a naturalist core of human nature sustaining universal morallaws, complemented with a historicist account of human nature filling in the more transient values of particular periods. The naturalist account of human nature largely loses its function, and it is now the dynamic, historicist account which defines the content of the universal naturallaw. Galipeau does not see the recourse to the dynamic, historical aspect of human nature as necessarily debilitating to Berlin's thought. He writes: "That these notions of natural and human rights arose historically does not render them any less valid. It is a virtue of Berlin's political thought that it recognizes the historical genesis ofnorms, while maintaining that universal statements about human nature are possible.,,118 This interpretation, however, leads to a whole new set of general difficulties. For one thing, it makes Berlin's thought look distinctly ethnocentric, imposing a value characteristic of Western societies universally on mankind as a whole. This weakness is reflected in Galipeau's admission that "While Berlin knows that sorne ofthese core values are Western, he none the less finds it hard to imagine others not holding to them.,,119 ria] The deeper and more serious difficulties, however, concern how a historical discovery can assert universal authority. Galipeau seems on one hand to want to appeal to advances in empirical knowledge, 120 which are, however, exactly what is brought into question by historical counter-examples, and on the other hand to deep-seated commitments among modern Westerners that certain values and laws are integral to human nature,121 which need not extend beyond the contemporary Western form of life. Nonetheless, on Galipeau's account, the authority of the morallaw is retroactive, so that he

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asserts that Berlin's thought involves an account of "progress in our moral development," with the consequence that modern societies are more advanced than, for example, the Greeks. 122 This move, however, seems to contrast sharply with Galipeau's earlier assertion that " ... if cultural manifestations have to be understood in context, then it is a gross distortion of the facts ofhistory to apply contemporary standards to past ages.,,123 Galipeau even allows here that Berlin's thought includes "teleological aspects,,,124 albeit "restrained and modest." These views, however, regardless oftheir modesty, seem to open Berlin to his own critiques ofteleological and progressive or cumulative views ofhuman nature. Berlin, moreover, repeatedly rejects both teleology and a general view ofhuman progress. 125 Again then, the insistence on universal morallaws carries Berlin into serious inconsistencies. In SUffi then, a variation of the traditional strong liberal view has been developed in recent years by writers like Galipeau and Weinstock which involves a universal morallaw concentrated on a hard core sense of negative liberty. This reading allows a wider latitude to pluralism than the traditional strong liberal readings, and places more emphasis on romantic elements in Berlin's thought, like his historicism. Ultimately, however, this reading suffers from many of the same deficiencies as the strong liberal interpretation. It reveals serious issues of underdevelopment, underdetermination, and even inconsistency in Berlin' s thought, particularly connected with his treatment of negative liberty. 126 The strong and weak liberal readings of Berlin are essentially variations on a single basic approach to Berlin's work which identifies his commitment to negative liberty as the focal point ofhis thought. Strong liberals give comparatively extensive accounts of 'a regime of negative liberty,' weak liberal readings a comparatively narrow account of 'basic civilliberties.' Whatever the range of this value of negative liberty, it is accorded a sharp procedural priority on political questions. This priority is generally framed in universal terms and looks for support, whether successfully or not, to a
universal model ofhuman nature, often re-enforced by a general theory of moral

progress. On the other hand, Berlin is treated as skeptical of positive liberty, except inso-far as it takes the form of claims to democratic self-governance firmly regulated by a prior commitment to negative liberty. This skepticism is characteristically more apparent in strong liberal readings, but remains present, if more muted, on weak liberal readings.

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A romantic influence on Berlin's thought is recognized, but downplayed in terms ofhis liberal commitments, particularly on the strong readings. Pluralism and tragedy, for example, are subordinated to, or restrained by, a prior commitment to negative liberty.

2.v Pluralist Readings of Berlin

On the liberal readings, whether strong or weak, negative liberty (or at least a core of it) is protected as a universal value by a firm procedural priority, in essence, by a special status. Another group ofwriters, however, who have established themselves particularly in the last five or six years, have identified Berlin as fundamentally a strong pluralist, often a value pluralist, but always one who tries at least to argue that pluralism entails, or at least justifies, sorne liberalisrn - in other words, as a thinker whose liberalism is effectively contingent on its linkage to his pluralism. The attribution of this structure to Berlin's thought has already been foreshadowed in Ignatieffs reading of Berlin, but what distinguishes readings of this type is that, in contrast to Ignatieffs construction, it is pluralism which constrains and limits liberalism (in the sense of negative liberty) rather than vice versa: in other words, liberalism is viewed as plausible in the degree to which it can be made compatible with the daims of pluralism, instead of the other way around. Negative liberty need not be accorded any special procedural privilege. It is viewed, at least in principle, as part of a range of sometimes incompatible, sometimes incommensurable values which may come into collision, and over whose conflict no overarching principle can be authoritatively adduced. Although there are, of course, important differences among pluralist readings, they generally hold the following qualities in common: on pluralist readings, (1) Berlin' s ultimate presupposition is seen as pluralism, sometimes value-pluralism, or a 'fact of value pluralism. (2) He attempts to justifY his liberalism (whether successfully or not) on the basis ofhis ultimate cornmitrnent strong pluralism. (3) Berlin is seen as deeply influenced by the Romantics and other counter-Enlightenment thinkers. For example, while strong pluralist readings do not necessarily deny that Berlin's work exhibits an aspiration towards the identification ofhuman universals, they nonetheless generally emphasize the historicist aspect of his work, and even sometimes read him as a radical historicist ultimately committed to a view of human nature as primarily characterized by "unpredictably self-transformation." (4) The tragic theme is also characteristically central

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on these readings, and takes a far more troubling form than on liberal readings, emphasizing 'unavoidable harms' rather than 'inevitable losses.' Negative liberty, which was insulated in varying degrees on liberal readings, becomes on these interpretations a potential object of radical and tragic choice. (5) Finally, positive liberty is permitted to rise to a position of equal ultimacy with negative liberty in principle, although Berlin's historical argument against monistic positive liberty is recognized as containing an important warning about relying on certain forms of positive liberty to the exclusion of negative liberty. 1 also want to call attention to an extreme variation of the strong pluralist position which has assumed a prominent place in the criticalliterature on Berlin, mainly as a focal point of criticism, but which has also been given a sympathetic articulation by Richard Rorty. This position can be framed as an absolute pluralist or relativist reading. In essence, this position differs in degree from the strong pluralist reading in a manner analogous to the strong liberal interpretation in relation to the weak. Absolute pluralists or relativists press the strong pluralist claim that sorne values may be incommensurable to the extreme by asserting the stronger claim that values are generally or always incommensurable, especially when they appear as aspects of different forms of life. On this view, there is no objective correlative to which concepts or values relate at all, so that all values are ultimately similarly subjective. This reading gives a very strong account of the romantic, historicist, and tragic elements in Berlin's thought.

2.v Berlin as a Strong Pluralist

My primary case study of the general strong pluralist reading of Berlin is John Gray. 1will show first that Gray's reading qualifies as a strong pluralist reading. In this section, 1will try to show, first, that Gray's interpretation of Berlin fits the strong pluralist characterization, and, second, that his reading nonetheless reproduces many of the difficulties, particularly in terms of underdevelopment, underdetermination and
inconsistency that are evident on the liberal readings.

The essence of Gray's interpretation rests on a reading of Berlin's concept of human nature as resting on a single dominant trait - on "locating the most centrally constitutive mark of the species in the capacity for self-creation through choicemaking.,,127 Seeing mankind's centrally constitutive activity as unpredictable self-

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transformation through choice-making, Gray's Berlin finds value primarily in diverse, and often incompatible and incomparable, forms of human flourishing, each with its own system ofvalues, in essence on a condition ofvalue-pluralism: The central claim ofthis book is that aIl of Berlin's work is animated by a single idea of enormous subversive force. This is the idea, which 1 calI value pluralism, that ultimate human values are objective but irreducably diverse, that they are conflicting and often uncombinable, and that sometimes when they come into conflict with one another they are incommensurable; that is, they are not comparable by any rational measure .... Politicallife, like morallife, abounds in radical choices between rival goods and evils, where reason leaves us in the lurch and whatever is done involves sorne loss and sometimes tragedy .... On this Vichian and Herderian interpretation of Berlin, the bottom Zine is not a ZiberaI agon but agonistic pluralism. 128 [ia] The bottom line of this interpretation of Berlin is objective human diversity itself. As Weinstock has it, in Gray's vision ofpluralism "Any combination of values is acceptable." 129 Moreover, on Gray's reading of Berlin, the form and authority ofliberalism are treated as contingent on their linkage with pluralism - so that "when the two come into ultimate conflict, it is liberalism that is bound to yield.,,130 The core of Gray's critical argument is to demonstrate that value pluralism does not support traditional universalist liberalism - "the link between pluralism and liberalism... through negative liberty ... is broken,,131 - so that "What foIlows from the truth ofpluralism is that liberal institutions can have no universal authority.,,132 There is litde doubt then that in contrast with liberal readings, it is pluralism which constitutes Berlin's center of gravity, and which dictates the potential scope of liberalism. Gray's strong emphasis on Berlin's romanticism and historicism are also quite explicit and pervasive. In his own expression, Gray offers "a Vichian and Herderian interpretation of Berlin," 133 even 'against the grain' ofBerlin 's own self-understanding.' He asserts that his reading puts Berlin "closer to the Romantics and to the thinkers of what he caIls the Counter-Enlightenment than he is to the Enlightenment,,,134 and emphasizes that Berlin did embrace the main romantic criticisms of the Enlightenment, even ifhe did reject their doctrinal excesses. 135 He devotes the penultimate chapter ofhis book to bringing out the important and widely neglected romantic influences in Berlin's work, including his own central theme of value pluralism (as weIl as voluntarism,
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particularism and tragedy).136 Moreover, his central conception of human nature as continuaI unpredictable self-creation is, for both him and Berlin, the central and uniting image of the romantic revolt against the idea of human nature as primarily rational and stable. 137 Gray actually terms this understanding ofhuman nature primarily defined by self-creation the "historicist conception ofhuman nature." 138 Tragedy is both a central theme, and one which extends beyond mere losses to, as we will see, the necessity of doing wrong, of committing harm. The idea of self-creation leads to the recognition of deep divisions between cultures and historical periods, reflecting divergent basic images of the human self. He later dec1ares "That Berlin's is a historicist conception ofhuman nature cannot be doubted.,,139 However, on Gray's reading, this historicist view ofhuman nature is in deep tension with a set of quasi-Kantian categories ofuniversal human moral experience which he also finds in Berlin's writing. These "quasi-Kantian categories" constitute the basis of a "realist view," c1aiming "definite moral knowledge" that Gray attributes to Berlin - hence Berlin's "objective pluralism.,,14o Gray winds up suggesting that these categories seem poorly grounded and that much of the work of the categories could perhaps be better performed by a radical historicist conception of human nature conceived almost purely as unpredictably self-transforming. He does not, however, explore the effects of such a radical historicist shi ft in any detail. The fourth feature of the strong pluralist reading is the prominence of the themes of radical choice, and tragic conflict. This emergence is a natural concomitant of the emphasis on value pluralism, with its inherent rivalry of sometimes incompatible values, ideals, virtues, and concepts. Gray titles his interpretation of Berlin's thought 'agonistic pluralism' and on the first page ofhis introduction explains that he takes "the expression from the Greek word agon, whose meaning covers both competition or rivalry and the conflicts of characters in tragic drama." In sharp contrast with the dominant liberalisms of our time, agonistic liberalism describes a "Political life, [which,] like moral life, abounds in radical choices between rival goods and evils, where reason leaves us in the lurch and whatever is done involves loss and sometimes tragedy.,,141 The idea of radical conflict and tragedy could hardly, in Gray's view, be any more central. The final element which requires specifie mention is Gray's treatment of positive

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liberty, particularly in relation to its negative cousin. On the strong pluralist reading, positive liberty is recognized as in principle of similar weight as negative liberty, and rising potentially to the same level of equal significance. Gray argues that the commonplace understanding of Berlin's discussion ofliberty as a passionate defense of negative liberty and a fierce attack on positive liberty in general is deeply misconceived. 142 Gray explains that while "positive freedom ... designates an authentic species offreedom,"143 Berlin's argument warns against certain specifie forms, and most particularly the metaphor of self-mastery where the knowledge of the self is claimed by someone other than the literaI self. 144 In principle, positive and negative liberty make equally valid claims to the status of values, although on Gray' s reading neither is now taken to be ultimately constitutive. 145 Even negative liberty "is valuable primarily as a condition of self-creation through choice-making.,,146 On Gray's reading both forms of liberty become instrumental conditions of self-creation. Gray' s interpretation of Berlin then focuses clearly on strong pluralism as the center of gravity of Berlin' s thought. At each key point the contrast with the liberal readings is clear. First, the emphasis on strong pluralism, and corresponding subordination ofliberalism contrasts with the strong liberals' robust privilege for negative liberty, and the weak liberals' hard protection of a minimal core of negative liberty along with its weak formulation of pluralism. Similarly, Gray's primary concentration on the romantic influence in Berlin, and on his historicism, mark a significant departure from the liberal readings, particularly the strong ones. Similarly, the elevation of radical conflict and tragedy to central prominence, as well as their extension beyond mere irrecoverable loss to substantial harms, and to potentially encompass negative liberty and other liberal values, reflect an abrupt transition from the liberal readings. Finally, the raising of positive liberty to a status at least in principle similar to that of negative liberty conflicts with the liberal readings, and particularly the general
hostility to positive liberty characteristic of the strong liberal interpretations.

As on the liberal readings of Berlin, a number of very serious difficulties arise on this interpretation. In laying these out it may be helpful to begin with the sense in which Gray sees himselffrom the beginning as 'running against the grain' of Berlin's selfunderstanding. The step that Gray takes, "for which there is no clear authority in Berlin's

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writing" is to develop and privilege the historicist component in Berlin's writing, defined as human beings' propensity to unpredictable self-transformation - to give it a uniquely "constitutive" role that Berlin does not assign it. 147 This uniquely constitutive focus on continuaI human self-creation 1 will term radical historicism. The immediate result is to open up a gulf in Berlin' s writing between what then appear as two distinct accounts of human nature, one an ethical realist account and the other a historicist one: We have an indeterminacy here in Berlin's thought which parallels that afflicting his use ofthe term 'values.' When Berlin speaks of goods or evils that are generically human, or of virtues that occur in aIl known forms of morallife, he seems to conceive of the common framework of moral thought as having substantive content that is universal. In this case, there would have to be an enduring or constant, a common human nature, from which the universal element in morality springs. On the other hand, we find Berlin stressing again and again that man is a selftransforming animal, that nothing in his thought is in principle immune from alteration by the growth ofknowledge, that human needs are altered by changes in our conceptions ofthem and by the unpredictable consequences ofhuman choices, and that many human virtues and excellences are dependent upon, and partIy constituted by, cultural forms that are historically specific. 148 [ia] One side of Gray' s interpretation then involves an ethical realism which designates universal categories ofhuman experience and basic human values. Human beings are constituted by a "quasi-Kantian" "common framework ofthought that assures the objectivity of moral reasoning.,,149 These categories and values attain to universality, and are knowable to us. So human beings value justice and mercy, although these can clash, as can, for example, the virtues of courage and prudence. 150 These categories and values exhibit a strong internaI pluralism, and consequently, they seem to establish a strong core of pluralist values as a universal feature of human nature. Gray, however, demands, "where is there room in this historicist view for a common view of human nature?" \5\ The substantial universal content of ethical realism contrasts sharply with the understanding of man as constitutively defined by self-transformation. The first thing that emerges then, and overwhelmingly so, on Gray's reading, is an enormous inconsistency in Berlin's baseline conception ofhuman nature - either human beings are defined "constitutively" as self-transforming or as exhibiting substantial universal categories and values. Moreover, both formulations ofhuman nature involve

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universal claims to knowledge which Gray thinks, and not without reason, face serious problems ofjustification in Berlin's thought. 152 Ultimately, Gray advocates either jettisoning or radicaUy reconfiguring the quasi-Kantian categories to bring them into line with his historicist concept of human nature - a move he plausibly grants Berlin might be reluctant to undertake. 153 In terms of internaI cohesion and integrity, the consequences of Gray' s unauthorized reformulation are less than ideal. Moreover, these immediate consequences must raise the question of why Gray chooses creative self-transformation as the basic category ofhuman nature to privilege as uniquely constitutive? As exemplified in the epigrams at the beginning of this dissertation, Berlin does talk about the romantics fracturing or cracking modem consciousness, and leaving modem individuals oscillating between two different models, stuck with a foot in each. What he emphaticaUy denies, however, is that the romantic model succeeded in supplanting or supervening Enlightenment values. Rather, he suggests that the two models now co-exist. He even emphasizes that the Enlightenment values have experienced something of a renaissance in the second half of the twentieth century.154 None ofthis, however, seems consistent with recognizing self-creation as a supreme constitutive value. Moreover, Berlin also writes ofrationality, language, imagination, moral agency as general categories of human experience. Each alone might make at least as much sense ofBerlin's work as an exclusive emphasis on selftransformation. Together, they might do much better. It is not at all clear what distinguishes self-creation as the most constitutive human activity, nor, as Gray allows, how Berlin might go about justifying so ambitious and universal a claim. FinaUy, the attempt to connect Berlin to self-creation as the constitutive human good has Gray putting Berlin close to sorne of the most radical thinkers of the romantic movement, such as Hamann, Kierkegaard, and even, more equivocally, Fichte and Nietzsche, and sorne of its most radical doctrines, such as the "apotheosis of will," "radical voluntarism" and "particularism," the "elevation of the particular over the general," "the celebration of singularity in human life, of aU which is surd... " as well as the central valuation of "selfcreation through choice-making.,,155 l want to suggest that while Gray does a great service in bringing out sorne of the deep romantic influences in Berlin's thought, in contrast to most liberal readings, he may overcompensate in connecting Berlin so closely

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with many of its most radical doctrines and figures. Berlin himself distinguishes between "restrained" and "unbridled romantics," and appears far more influenced by the former than the latter. 156 The second major consequence of the Gray effect is to render Berlin's liberalism seriously underdetermined, at least to the extent that Berlin wanted to, as Gray suspects, defend a traditional universalist liberalism: "what does follow from the truth of pluralism is that liberal institutions can have no universal authority.,,157 Gray leaves room for a possible contextual justification for liberalism as having the best chance of meeting the universal minimum content of morality, but even this he suggests that he finds dubious. 158 Other ways of life may do as well or better. Value pluralists, in Gray' s construction, are not basically committed to liberalism. They are committed to the value of "authentic varieties of human flourishing" over "the exercise of free choice by its [or their] members.,,159 In addition, in his elaboration of Berlin's thought, Gray draws on ethical realism to give content to his views oftragedy and of 'the objectivity of social conditions,' and other themes. It is unc1ear, however, how these themes survive the rejection of ethical realism. They appear to become underdetermined. What is perhaps most sharply striking on Gray's reading is that freedom, positive or negative, is not taken to be an ultimate objective value, an end-in-itself, but a condition of self-creation. In other words, negative liberty becomes for Berlin an instrumental, secondary value. Indeed, once self-creation is raised to a uniquely constitutive position, it would seem that few if any of the values Berlin prizes could be recognized as ultimate ends-in-themselves, and certainly the idea which Berlin is continually advocating, of a range of equally ultimate objective human values, ceases to make very much sense, as there is already a single dominant constitutive value in unpredictable self-creation. One of the points 1 will stress throughout this dissertation is how radically inconsistent with
Bcrlin's writing this treatment is.

Gray offers an engaging and challenging re-interpretation of Berlin's work as reflecting a very specific, and 1 will suggest radical, historicism and value pluralism. While his reading does not yet make the turn into what 1 will discuss below as absolute pluralism or relativism - as no doubt it retains a general objective structure ofvalue,

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however diffuse - it clearly coheres poorly with many aspects of Berlin's work. Like the liberal readings, it generates underdevelopment, underdetermination, and inconsistency. The same aspect of Berlin's thought which has attracted strong pluralist readings has also frequently attracted charges of relativism from more traditional or mainstream political thinkers. Evidently, this last cluster of readings is generaUy critical rather than constructive. Relativism in the main does not so much represent a reading of Berlin as a charge against him, and particularly against strong pluralist readings of him. The point is generaUy not that Berlin positively embraced relativism, but that his pluralistic thought lacked the backbone to resist a degeneration into effective relativism. Nonetheless, there are enough interpretations clustering around this charge that it deserves brief treatment.

2.vii Berlin as a Relativist

ln the course ofhis article on "AUeged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," Berlin himselfprovides a fairly clear, standard statement ofwhat relativism entails: Relativism is ... a doctrine according to which the judgment of a man or a group, since it is the expression or statement of a taste, or emotional attitude or outlook, is simply what it is, with no objective correlative which determines its truth or falsehood. 1 like mountains, you do not; 1 love history, he thinks it is bunkum: it aU depends on one's point ofview.... The most extreme versions of cultural relativism... hold that one culture can scarcely begin to understand what other cultures live by - can only describe their behavior but not its purpose or 160 meanmg. Relativism in general is characterized by the claim that values are finally subjective creations of individuals and societies, without objective correlatives, so that where they differ, there is no point in arguing about them. Values are generally incommensurable and only subjectively justifiable. They differ and that is all - "'1 prefer coffee, you prefer champagne. We have different tastes. There is no more to be said.' That is relativism.
Il

161

Strong forms of cultural relativism suggests that where divergent values

are bound up in different forms of life, there is little possibility of understanding them at
aU, for each is bound up in its own distinctive, impermeable language and moral world.

The core ofthis reading of Berlin then is an absolute value pluralism - absolute both in the sense of being a permanent feature of the human condition, and in the sense that it is unbridgeable in terms ofjudgment, and on strong forms, understanding. At best, a crude communication is sometimes possible. Sorne more moderate relativists will

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allow important exceptions, and therefore will say only a great majority of value conflicts will be radical or tragic. In either case the presumption, the general default position, remains that basic conflicts will be generally irreconcilable. Although there are a great many treatments of Berlin ofthis sort, 1 will here look briefly at two: first, probably the most famous critical charge of relativism leveled against Berlin, this by Michael Sandel, and secondly, the most important sympathetic reading of Berlin along these lines, which is found in the work of Richard Rorty. Michael Sandel does not directly charge Berlin with relativism, but rather observes that Berlin's "position cornes perilously close to foundering on the relativist predicament." The remainder ofhis remarks, however, essentially challenge Berlin to show how he can, given his pluralist assumptions, possibly avoid the relativist reefs into which he blithely sails. Sandel quotes the famous conclusion to "Two Essays on Liberty," and then comments as follows: In view of the ultimate plurality of ends, Berlin concludes, freedom of choice is 'a truer and more humane ideal' than the alternatives. And he quotes with approval the view of Joseph Schumpeter that 'to realize the relative validity of one's convictions, and yet stand for them unflinchingly, is what distinguishes a civilized man from a barbarian.' Although Berlin is not strictly speaking a relativist - he affirms the ideal of freedom of choice - his position cornes perilously close to foundering on the relativist predicament. If one's convictions are only relatively valid, why stand for them unflinchingly? In a tragically-configured moral universe, such as Berlin assumes, is the ideal of freedom any less subject than competing ideals to the ultimate incommensurability of values? If so, in what can its privileged status consist? And if freedom has no morally privileged status, if it is just one value among many, then what can be said for liberalism?162 In essence, if from a universal standpoint values are irreducably plural, what can allow Berlin to privilege one particular value, freedom of choice, over other values? Sandel seems to regard the reference to convictions that are only 'relatively valid' as an admission on Berlin's part that he has found no adequate foundations for liberalism, and concludes that Berlin's value of freedom of choice is just one particular value among "the ultimate plurality ofhuman values,,,l63 attached exclusively to its own peculiar frame of reference, bereft of objective correlative, and, from a general perspective, indistinguishable from others. Berlin's thought can only point to relatively valid daims, embedded in the contingent world of the claimants, and these can be produced in

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sickening abundance, a universe of distinct but similarly self-endosed worlds colliding the relativist predicament. Thus, 'if it is just one value among many, then what can be said for liberalism?' Sandel's reference to Berlin's tragically-configured universe points to the fact that here, for the first time in the readings of Berlin, we have entered what may be a fully tragic vision, where there is no single overriding universal quality ofhuman nature in which to take refuge in the case of profound value conflicts. Indeed, here we have run to the opposite end of the spectrum from whence we began, where a broad conception of negative liberty was insulated from tragic conflict. In the 'tragically-configured' universe Sandel is attributing to Berlin, value conflicts in general will give rise to radical choice, and anytime the values in question are deeply held, we will be facing a potentially tragic conflict. A moral world which privileged negative liberty is no more or less defensible than one which privileged a locally resonant conception of positive liberty. Here tragedy is not merely present, but ubiquitous. A more sympathetic but essentially similar account of Berlin's relativism is offered by Richard Rorty. Rorty, unlike Sandel, invokes Berlin in a positive light, "to give sorne initial plausibility to his [own] view." ln order to exploit Berlin's authority, he points to alleged "parallels between his own position and "Isaiah Berlin's defense of 'negative liberty' against telic conceptions of human perfection." 164 Indeed, Rorty undertakes to show how Berlin can assimilate charges of relativism in order to illustrate how "the charge of relativism looks from [his own] point of view" that is, as an

indirect defense of his own position, which is often similarly charged with relativism. Rorty outlines sorne of this overlap between himself and Berlin in discussing the appeal to Schumpeter in the conclusion of "Two Concepts of Liberty:" ln the jargon 1have been developing, Schumpeter's daim that this is the mark of the civilized person translates into the daim that the liberal societies of our century have produced more and more people who are able to recognize the contingency of the vocabulary in which they state their highest hopes - the contingency of their own consciences - and yet have remained faithful to those consciences. 165 These modem liberals, in other words, give up the notion that their own or anyone else's views can be absolutely valid: "The notion of absolute validity does not make sense

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except on the assumption of a self which divides fairly neatly into the part it shares with the divine and the part it shares with the animals.,,166 Since this idea of the person is no longer generally or publicly accepted, there is little reason to think in terms of absolute validity on moral and political matters. Sandel is therefore still speaking in an archaic idiom when he poses his challenge to Berlin of coming up with absolute foundations for liberalism, and "... from the point of view of those who are trying to use the new language, to literalize the new metaphors, those who cling to the old language will be viewed as irrational - as victims of passion, prejudice, superstition, the dead hand of the past, and so on." 167 In Rorty's mind, we are hermetically sealed into our own contingent worlds. Rorty extends this argument of entrapment in the particular, which he claims to derive from Davidson, Heidegger and Wittgenstein, to Berlin as well, and argues that in light of it, the appropriate response to Sandel's challenge is to refuse to answer it. Rorty writes: "To sum up, the moral 1 want to draw from my discussion of the claim that Berlin's position is "relativistic" is that this charge should not be answered, but rather evaded." 168 "We should learn to brush aside [such] questions .... " In essence, on the old Enlightenment vocabulary, Berlin appears in Rorty's formulation as unquestionably relativistic (like Rorty himself), but this is not important because the vocabulary of the question is effectively obsolete. Rorty describes his own response as follows: "So my strategy will be to try to make the vocabulary in which these objections are phrased look bad, thereby changing the subject, rather than granting the objector his choice of weapons and terrain by meeting his criticisms head_on.',I69 At this point, Rorty draws on a number of arguments offered by Donald Davidson to the effect that while people cannot be expected to recognize the contingency of their values, language games, or frames of reference, or moral worlds: We cannot assume that liberals ought to be able to rise above the contingencies of history and see the kind of individual freedom which the modern liberal state offers its citizens as just one more value .... For there will be no way to rise above language, culture, institutions, and practices one has adopted and view these on a par with all others. 170 The inability to recognize the contingency of one's own framework provides a rationale for simply dismissing questions posed within alternative frameworks. This recognition of

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contingency does, however, seem to be part of what Berlin is calling for - "to realize the

relative validity ofone 's own convictions ... and yet stand for them unflinchingly is what
distinguishes a civilized man from a barbarian." Seen from Berlin's position, Rorty's argument seems to imply that there can be no civilized men capable of recognizing the relative validity of their own convictions. Yet, to be civilized in this way is exactly what Berlin goes on to demand. In defending Berlin, then, Rorty seems already to be introducing inconsistencies into Berlin's thought. Up to a point, Rorty's reading seems forceful, particularly echoing Berlin's condemnation of modem monism and telic conceptions and in capturing Berlin's profound discomfort with absolute validity daims, but already there are elements which push the envelope in awkward directions. Rorty's response in the face of Sandel's critique of Berlin, for example, seems to draw on just such an absolute validity daim itself- the claim that no absolute validity could have universal authority for, or resonance with, us. Moreover, Berlin does not seem to try to avoid charges of relativism, or those who think in a monist idiom, but rather confronts them. 171 On relativist readings, Berlin's thought is treated not only as contextual but as locked into its own particular time and place. As Berlin has it, relativism "represents the universe as a prison."I72 The commitment to liberalism is not rationally determined or directly entailed by pluralism. These readings emphasize the romantic elements of Berlin's thought, particularly romanticism in its most unbridled forms. Berlin is assimilated within a deeply anti-philosophical, anti-rationalist tradition. 173 In particular, the tragic theme reaches its most extensive and alarming expression, for it has become effectively ubiquitous. Both positive and negative liberty receive equal treatment in principle, both constituting merely relative values, but in practice, the interpretation of Berlin as developing a purely particularist, locally-rooted theory allows Rorty to reintroduce sorne of the features of strong liberalism familiar from the first reading, now
framed as local, particular rather than universal values. In aH these respects then the

cases introduced of the fourth line of interpretation correspond fairly closely to the expectations outlined. Even focusing on the most conducive references in Berlin, inconsistencies arise. When these are placed in the overall context of Berlin' s frequent rejections of relativism

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(indeed what we will see are his harsh critiques of it), the inconsistencies inherent in the relativist reading of Berlin are dramatically deepened. Berlin makes no effort to develop a defense of relativism. What he does develop, as we will see in more detail in Chapter 5, is a critique of relativism. Moreover, prominent aspects ofBerlin's thought seem to underdetermine a relativist outcome. As Sandel acknowledges, Berlin definitely wants to attribute an objective status to negative liberty, for example. Similarly, Berlin's continuaI critique of ethical monism gives every appearance of a claim that sorne values and value structures are more defensible than others. These components of his thought seem to leave a relativist turn critically underdetermined. The relativist reading then also seems to beg problems of underdevelopment, underdetermination, and inconsistency in Berlin's thought.

2.viii Conclusion
This brings us to the end of an admittedly very crude and partial introduction to the main readings of Berlin. The general classification does show sorne promise in illuminating at least an important range of the remarkably diverse readings which have been offered of Berlin. It will already probably be apparent that my own reading of Berlin as a pluralist liberal overlaps at least at sorne important points with each of these established readings, but it also differs in important ways from each of them. 1 pause here only to suggest three thoughts on these established readings that may bear sorne reflection, and to briefly refresh the position 1 will be arguing. First, the monist presumption which Berlin invested so much critical energy opposing - that foundations had to be either immovable bedrock or no foundations at aU - is pervasive in the interpretation of his own work. In light of this assumption, each line of interpretation offers Berlin a different absolute or universal foundation: either sorne sort of maximal negative liberty (consonant with basic social order), or at least a hard core ofnegative liberty, or an a priori commitment to the constitutive value of self-creation through
choicc-making, or to an absolute pluralism of impermeable moral worlds. ln insisting on

such firm foundations, of whatever type, each of these lines of interpretation derogate from Berlin's essential pluralist insight - that there can be, at least to the best ofhis understanding, no final solutions, no literaI universals, no hard foundations whether weak or strong. Reasonable people can disagree over difficult philosophical problems so that

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the most basic assumptions, values, concepts and models, including liberalism and pluralism, may (although not must) be contentious. In philosophical thought, both problems and methods of solution come into question nothing is given, and, in the

long term, nothing can be guaranteed, although whatever is chosen need not be unreasoned or the less sacred for those who choose it for aIl its impermanence. Berlin protests that "relativism is not the only alternative to universalism." 174 Once the monist presumption is surrendered, and a pluralist premise introduced, then this false dichotomy dissipates, and we are able to perceive the possibility of plausible, even persuasive, moral and political judgments. Charles Taylor, in developing his own pluralist position, makes this same point in a way 1 think Berlin would appreciate in opposition to what he calls naturalism (with its "atomist affinities,,175), a concept that overlaps a great deal with Berlin's idea of monism: ... there is no a priori truth here [in naturalism/monism]. Our belief in it is fed by the notion that there is nothing between an extra-human ontic foundation for the good on one hand, and the pure subjectivism of arbitrarily conferred significance on the other. But there is a third possibility... of a good which is inseparable from our best interpretation. 176
1 will argue that Berlin's moral and political thought is similarly framed first and

foremost as a best interpretation of our own moral and political condition. Berlin, as he often reminds us, wants no part of either moral certainty or moral relativism. 1 will argue that Berlin's best interpretation is grounded in a moderate but consistent historicism. Second, and perhaps not unrelatedly, each of the established readings burdened Berlin's thought with deep difficulties ofunderdevelopment, underdetermination and/or inconsistency. In this sense it is fair to say that a really satisfying reading of Berlin has yet to emerge. These difficulties seem to cluster around diverse interpretations of Berlin's basic understanding ofhuman nature and the human condition on one hand and the substance ofhis moral and political commitments on the other.
The critical question, however, remains the content ofBerlin's best interpretation.

1 will argue in essence that Berlin is best read as deeply influenced by the insights,

methods and ultimate values of the moderate romantics, but as also seeing certain core Enlightenment ideas and ultimate values as surviving their critique. The resulting vision culminates in a range of equally ultimate and sometimes rivalrous values, no one of

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which is uniquely privileged. It is an understanding of political thought grounded on the one hand in a moderate historicist approach to the humanities, and which gives rise to a distinctive pluralist liberalism on the other. It finds expression in a precarious equilibrium ofultimate values in public life. This reading could be said, not inaccurately, to try to occupy in novel fashion the ample space between liberal and pluralist readings. l will argue against the liberal readings of Berlin, whether weak or strong, that Berlin's primary commitment is to a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate basic values which includes, but does not privilege, negative liberty. The center of gravity of Berlin' s moral and political thought is a descriptive and normative defense of a variant of strong pluralism, focused on a limited but open-ended range of ultimate values which he argues are objectively recognizable within the modem West. On the other hand, Berlin's pluralism does not rely, as many defenders and critics ofhis strong pluralism suggest, on an a priori conception of man whose constitutive activity is self-creation through choice-making or on the mutual impenetrability of moral worlds. His pluralism does not find expression in a blanket embrace of diverse forms of human flourishing or diversity. Rather, Berlin first and foremost defends an uneasy, agitated, and precarious equilibrium of a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate basic values within our own form of life. Both negative liberty and pluralism are encompassed within this range of equally ultimate values, so that neither attains a uniquely privileged or constitutive position. FinaIly, he insists on the possibility of communication, understanding and even judgment not only within, but also between, diverse historical forms of life. What forms the core of Berlin's moral and political thought then is his interpretation of the "public world of common values" which he insists is recognizable within the modem West, sorne of which seem to have been shared by human societies quasi-universaIly. Difficult problems, he argues, should be continually worked out in light ofthis limited but open-ended range of values on a case-by-case basis. It is this multi-faceted, case-sensitive center of Berlin's thought which has resulted both in the difficulty in pigeonholing his thought, the remarkable diversity ofthe basic positions attributed to him, as weIl as the accusations of underdetermination and inconsistency so frequently leveled at his work. Berlin develops this position on the basis of a moderate

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but consistent historicist approach to philosophy, history and the understanding of human nature influenced deeply by what he refers to as the restrained romantics. This approach produces a lirnited, interpretive understanding, not certain or universal moral knowledge. 1 will argue, contrary to most pluralist readings, that this understanding conduces well to the type of liberalism Berlin embraces, liberalism of a pluralist variety. ln the next chapter 1 focus on developing the moderate but consistent historicist framework of Berlin's thought. This subject provides an opportunity to respond to the most important charge of inconsistency regularly leveled at Berlin. In the following chapter 1 explore his moral and political thought. The core of Berlin's political thought is read as a calI for an unstable equilibriurn of equally ultimate values. This reading provides sorne opportunity to respond to charges of underdevelopment leveled at Berlin. ln chapter five 1 connect these two positions together through his understanding of human nature in the modem West, and show that this reading retains adequate backbone to resist sorne of the most important critiques which have been leveled at Berlin's work. This chapter offers sorne answer to the charge ofunderdetermination in Berlin's work.

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Notes

Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 257 - Ignatieff emphasizes Berlin's identification with Turgenev (as well as with Herder) at several junctures, including p. 71, 159,224. 2 Normal Podhoretz, "A Dissent on Isaiah Berlin," Commentary, Volume 107 (February 1999), p. 35. 3 For example, Erick Mack, "Isaiah Berlin and the Quest for Liberal Pluralism," Public Alfairs Quarterly, Volume 7, Number 3 (July 1993), p. 226 - 7; or, on the other hand, Marshall Cohen, "Berlin and the Liberal Tradition," Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 10, Number 40, p. 2117 -19. 4 Normal Podhoretz, "A Dissent on Isaiah Berlin," p. 34 and p. 37. 5 Michael Ignatieff, p. 246. 6 Ignatieffrelates a classic case in connection with Berlin's statements on the American war in Viet Nam, Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 255. 7 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 3,9 and p. 139; and Richard Wollheim, "the Idea of a Common Human Nature," in Edna and Avishai Margalit, Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 78 - 9; and Michael Ignatieff, "Understanding Fascism," in Edna and Avishai Margalit, Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 132 and 139. 8 For example, Charles Taylor, "What's Wrong With Negative Liberty," in Alan Ryan (ed.), The Idea ofFreedom: Essays in Honor ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 176 - 7, 179. 9 Alasdair MacIntyre, p. 109, 142 - 5 and particularly 143,236 8; also see John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 58. 10 Charles Taylor, "What's Wrong With Negative Liberty," in Alan Ryan (ed.), The Idea ofFreedom: Essays in Honor ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 176 - 9. II John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2. 12 Michael Ignatieff, "Understanding Fascism," in Edna and Avishai Margalit, Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 132; John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2.; Stuart Hampshire, p. "Nationalism" in Edna and Avishai Margalit, Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 127 - 134; Berlin himself remarks on this perception, Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 255. 13 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2. 14 Aileen Kelly, "A Revolutionary Without Fanaticism," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p.3 - 30. 15 For example, Quentin Skinner, "The Idea of Negative Liberty," in Richard Rorty, 1. B. Scheewind, and Qentin Skinner (ed.s), Philosophy in History (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1984), p. 194 - 217; and C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 102 - 17. 16 C. J. Galipeau, p. 149 - 52, 156, 158, 163; John Gray, lsaiah Berlin, p. 101 - 3, and 106 - 8. 17 Ronald H. Mckinney, "Towards a Postmodern Ethics: Sir Isaiah Berlin and John Caputo," Journal of Value Inquiry, Volume 26 (1992), p. 395. 18 Jonathan Riley, "Interpreting Berlin's Liberalism," American Political Science Review, Volume 95, Number 2 (June 2001), p. 283 - 295.
1

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Simon Upton, "Berlin as an Anti-Rationalist," Philosophy and Literature, Volume 21 (1997) - here, Upton's title refers to Gray's reading of Berlin as an anti-rationalist reading, but he seems willing to entertain this take on Berlin as at very least radieally eonstraining the kind reasoned argument Berlin ean bring to defending his liberalism - p. 430 - 1; also see, Gordon Leff, The Tyranny ofConcepts (London: Merlin Press, 1961), p. 146 - 9; and J.A. Passmore, "History, The Individual and Inevitability," Philosophical Review, Volume 68, Number 1 (1959), p. 93 - 102 - see Berlin' s reference on this, Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxiv - xxxvn. 20 David Pears, "Philosophy and the History of Philosophy," in Edna and Avishai Margalit, Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 22 - 4; and Michael Ignatieff, Lmiah Berlin: A Life, p. 228. 21 Galipeau, for example, talks of Larry Siedentop characterizing Berlin disposition as essentially aristocratie and intellectually conservative (Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "AlI Souls Interview," Taped Interview, 23 May, 1988, p. Il - 2). Michael Ignatieff discusses the tendency to see Berlin in this light at sorne length (Michael Ignatieff, Lmiah Berlin: A Life, p. 256 - 8); also Marshall Cohen, "Berlin and the Liberal Tradition," p. 217 -19. 22 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 45 - 54; Leo Strauss, The Rebirth ofClassical Political Rationalism, Thomas Pangle (ed.) (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989), p. 14 - 7; Norman Podhoretz, p. 34 - 5 and p. 37. 23 Michael Ignatieff, "Understanding Fascism," p. 138. 24 Robert Kocis, "Towards a Coherent Theory of Moral Development: Beyond Sir Isaiah Berlin's View of Human Nature," Political Studies, Volume XXXI, Number 3 (1983), p. 374 - 6 and p. 385 - 7; here Berlin's Kantian commitments to negative liberty are construed as part of a complex developmental theory of 'self-actualization.' The connection of negative liberty and self-realization sustains a positive tum on negative liberty analogous to Kant's rational autonomy, however minimalistic (it is a minimal baseline rather than a supreme expression ofhuman development). 25 C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 102 - 3. 26 C.J. Galipeau, p. 8 and later. 27 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 269. 28 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 315-316. 29 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 315. 30 The centrality ofpluralism to Berlin's work is evident not only in Berlin's essays in general, but it is the central theme he hits on in intellectual auto-biographical like "The Pur suit of the Ideal," and "Three Strands of My Life," as well as his summaries ofhis ideas recently published in The Power ofIdeas (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), such as "My Intelleetual Path." The most eloquent expression, however, is quoted from a letter to Jean Floud in Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 246 - 7. 31 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 22. 32 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 325.
19

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33

Gray and Galipeau and most sympathetic interpreters of course echo this view of Berlin's basic approach. (C.J.Galipeau, p. 26, 39; John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 4, Michael Ignatieff, "Understanding Fascism?" p. 35, Morgenbesser and Lieberson, "Isaiah Berlin," in Edna and Avishai Margalit (ed.s), Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 2). Even those detractors who see him as an unoriginal, merely synchretic thinker seem to allow special skill in this regard. Pohoretz, an example of a man who we shall soon see is as sceptical as any about Berlin's greatness, grudgingly allows, "He had other impressive qualities as weIl. No one could surpass him in the extremely difficult enterprise of summarizing and tracing the pedigree of an idea and in cutting to the core of another thinker's point of view." (Norman Podhoretz, p. 33) Robert Kocis, in an article critiquing Berlin, captures his aspiration nicely, "Sir Isaiah Berlin rightly contends that the 'ideas of every philosopher concemed with human affairs in the end rest on his conception of what man is and can be.' To understand such thinkers, it is more important to grasp this central notion or image, which may be implicit, but which determines their picture of the world, than even the most forceful arguments with which they defend their views and refute actual and possible objections." (Kocis, "Towards a Coherent Theory of Moral Development: Beyond Sir Isaiah Berlin's View of Human Nature," p. 370) As Kocis goes on to explain, Berlin employs this strategy with such such subtlety and sensitivity that he is able to come very close to reconciling the seemingly antithetical ideas of "Kantian individualism and Herderian pluralism." (p. 370) Indeed, Berlin1s "almost-coherent liberalism" cornes so close to succeeding, that in Kocis' view it can still be salvaged by identifying and setting aside Berlin's own implicit teleology and embracing "an 'open-ended' (or non-teleological) developmentalism." (Kocis, "Towards a Coherent Theory of Moral Development: Beyond Sir Isaiah Berlin's View of Human Nature," p. 371, also see, 385 - 7). 34 R. G. Collingwood, An Essay on Metaphysics, (Oxford 1940, chapter 5, quoted, for example, in Ignatieff, 203, and perhaps more importantly in Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Science and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 355). 35 Michael Ignatieff, p. Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 204. 36 Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 200 - 1. Berlin is reminded here that someone, he thinks it might have been Bertrand Russell, once remarked that "the deepest convictions of philosophers are seldom contained in their formaI arguments." For an excellent summary ofthis approach see Isaiah Berlin, "Joseph de Maistre and the Origins of Fascism," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 161. 37 Patrick Gardiner, "Introduction," in Isaiah Berlin, The Sense ofReality, p. xiii. 38 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 228. 39 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 226. 40 Michael Ignatieff, lwiah Berlin: A L(fe, p. 229. 41 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 285. 42 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 228 and 285. 43 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 226. 44 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 285. 45 Michael Ignatieff, "Understanding Fascism," p.l39. 46 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 250. 47 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 226.
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48
49

1 explore these different types more c10sely in chapter 4. It is at the core, for example, of all emancipatory theories of politics, Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 226. 50 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 226 - 7. 51 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 230. 52 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 257. 53 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 250. 54 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 249. 55 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A L?fe, p. 250. 56 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 229. 57 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 229 - this actual phrase refers in particular to "Two Concepts of Liberty," but lower down the page he extends this analysis to Berlin's work in general. 58 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 229 - 30; this is perfectly true in the sense that Berlin does not appeal to absolute or permanent universal, but it does not indicate, as Ignatieff seems to take it to, that Berlin could not adequately ground his idea of 1iberalism at least loosely, within a particular conception ofhuman nature. This 100se, particular ground, however, does not give rise to a 'procedura1 priority' such as Ignatieff imagines. 59 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 149 - 151; Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 286. 60 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 249 - 50. 61 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 245 - 6, 257. 62 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 229. He refers to the last chapter in Gray's book on Berlin. 63 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 257. 64 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 231; see also Anthony Arblaster, The Rise and Decline of Western Liberalism (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1984), p. 309 - 332; and Brian Barry, "Self-Government Revisited," in David Miller and Larry Siedentop (ed.s), The Nature ofPolitical Theory (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983), p. 123. 65 Leo Strauss, The Rebirth ofClassical Political Rationalism, p. 15. 66 Leo Strauss, The Rebirth ofClassical Political Rationalism, p. 15. 67 Roger Hausheer, "Introduction," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. xxxi. 68 The immediately striking thing about Hausheer's reading, however, is that since the supreme consideration he seems to have in mind is the fact of deep pluralism itself ("rational solutions to all political questions are not available"), his argument seems finally to amount to the c1aim that pluralism itself elevates negative liberty to a categorical supremacy by prec1uding any alternative claim. This precluding of alternatives, however, seems neither consonant with the idea of pluralism itself, nor with the thrust of Berlin's discussion of liberty (which, after all, identifies two, not one, concept(s) of liberty). Moreover, Hausheer's argument seems to assume that any positive conception of positive liberty would necessarily be monistic, and consequent1y clash with pluralism, but Berlin seems to have no difficulty in allowing the possibility of pluralistic positive conceptions of liberty, and, as we will see, even suggests in response to Robert Kocis that his own contribution might be productively interpreted as just this sort of theory. Nonetheless, Hausheer maintains, in a fashion characteristic ofthis type of interpretation, that the elevation ofnegative liberty is more central to Berlin's thought than other countervai1ing considerations.
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Quentin Skinner, p. 194. Quentin Skinner, p. 194. 71 Quentin Skinner, p. 196. 72 Quentin Skinner, p. 202 - 17. 73 Charles Taylor, "What's Wrong With Negative Liberty," in Alan Ryan (ed.), The Idea ofFreedom: Essays in Honor ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 175. 74 Charles Taylor, "What's Wrong With Negative Liberty," p. 176. 75 Charles Taylor, "What's Wrong With Negative Liberty," p. 176 -7 and p. 179. 76 C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 102. 77 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 98 - 9; and Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A L(fe, p. 228. 78 C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 103 - 4. 79 C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 106 - 116. 80 C.B. Macpherson, "Berlin's Division of Liberty," p. 117 excepting PL3, democracy, which, as we will see in Section 6.i, is seen as legitimate, but which Macpherson thinks could be absorbed into negative liberty. 81 Robert Kocis, "Reason, Development, and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision ofPolitics," American Political Science Review, Volume 74, Number 1 (March 1980), p. 39. 82 Robert Kocis, "Reason, Development, and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision of Politics, " p. 49 - Although Berlin clearly does not think that they guarantee anything, since negative liberty can be perverted, and basic freedom itse1f may be wholly inadequate - not actualized. 83 Robert Kocis, "Reason, Development, and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision ofPolitics," p. 40. 84 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 250. 85 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 247. 86 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 245. 87 Daniel Weinstock, "The Graying of Berlin," Critical Review, Volume Il, Number 4, p. 487 - 91; C.l. Galipeau, p. 43, 108, 114, 120, 166 - 7, 177. 88 C.J. Galipeau, p. 119. 89 C.l. Galipeau, p. 115. 90 C.J. Galipeau, p. 114. 91 C.l. Galipeau, p. 114. 92 C.J. Galipeau, p. 49. 93 C.l. Galipeau, p. 113. 94 C.J. Ga1ipeau, p. 119. 95 C.J. Ga1ipeau, p. 111, 147 - 8, 150, 71. 96 C..T. Galipeau, p. 113. 97 Daniel Weinstock, p. 488 and p. 489. 98 Daniel Weinstock, p. 488. 99 Claude Galipeau, p. 43. 100 C.J. Galipeau, p. 118. 101 C.J. Galipeau, p. 120. 102 C.l. Galipeau, p. 118. 103 C.J. Ga1ipeau, p. 178.
70

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104 Daniel Weinstock, p. 495 - 6. Weinstock is referring here to David Pears, "Philosophy and the History ofPhilosophy" in Edna and Avishai Margalit (ed.s), Isaiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 38. 105 C.J. Galipeau, p. 46, 48, 80. 106 C.J. Galipeau, p. 54. 107 C.J. Galipeau, p. 41, 44,50 - 1,68- 9, 77, and especiaUy p. 78, 81, 102 - 3 and p. 144. 108 C.J. Galipeau, p. 115. 109 Berlin does argue that this distinction is not in fact as sharp as Hume and his foUowers have often argued, because many of our descriptive concepts also carry evaluative content. Nonetheless, there is an important gap here, and one which we will need very specifie argument to span - argument which Berlin does not provide. John Gray makes a very similar point on Isaiah Berlin, p. 24. 110 C.l Ga1ipeau, p. 115n. III C.J. Galipeau, p. 124. 112 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxviii; Indeed, Berlin argued that individua1liberty in general was "not central to Greek culture, or, perhaps, any other ancient civilization known to US.,,112 (Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xli). 113 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. xl - xli; quoted on C.J. Galipeau, p. 129. 114 C.l Galipeau, p. 129. 115 C.J. Galipeau, p. 129. 116 C.J. Galipeau, p. 146. 117 C.J. Galipeau, p. 85. 118 C.J. Galipeau, p. 46. 119 C.l Galipeau, p. 119. 120 C.J. Galipeau, p. 115. 121 C.J. Galipeau, p. 114. 122 C.J. Ga1ipeau, p. 46. 123 C.J. Galipeau, p. 23. 124 C.l Galipeau, p. 117 - 9, and p. 169. 125 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 35, for example, and Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 389, p. 392 - 3, and Isaiah Berlin "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind; Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "AU Soul's Interview," p. 45. 126 The interpretation 1will offer ofthis key point in Berlin's work is that he sees a "basic" value ofliberty as quasi-universal for human beings. This "basic" sense of liberty, as we will see in chapter 4, is at the root ofboth positive and negative concepts of liberty, but it is, as Berlin repeatedly emphasizes, a non-po1itical concept - see, Isaiah Berlin, "Rep1y to Kocis," p. 391, and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxvii. The reason for this modest content attributed to basic liberty is given in a footnote in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lix - lxn. Here Berlin quotes Maistre and Herzen powerfuUy to the effect that not aU human beings have historicaUy pursued liberty. Aiso see C.J. Galipeau, p. 86n for an exerpt from a letter on this point, and also Atheneum Interview, p. 1 - 2. 127 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 110 - Il.

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John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 1 - 2, also see p. 166. Daniel Weinstock, p. 486 - 8. 130 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 166. 131 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 159. 132 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 155. 133 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2 and 156. 134 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 10. 135 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 118 - 9. 136 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 122 - 139. 137 John Gray, p. 96, 111; also see Isaiah Berlin, The Roots ofRomanticism, p. 118 - 122, 133, 138; Isaiah Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 570, 578 - 580; Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution," The Sense of Reality, p. 185 - 193. 138 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2, 67 and 74 - 5. 139 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 75, 84. 140 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 46 - 7, 49, and p. 136. 141 Also see, John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 1. 142 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 5 - 7. 143 Especially John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 17 - 8. 144 John Gray, p. Isaiah Berlin, 16,23,45. 145 In open contestation, however, Gray argues that Berlin sees the negative claim as the "most defensible, and most congenial to liberal concerns with diversity and toleration....", John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 21, 23,36. 146 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 31. 147 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2. 148 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 66 - 7. 149 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 70. 150 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 65 - 6. 151 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 67. 152 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 24 - 5, and p. 64 - 70 153 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 167. 154 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 202 - 6. 155 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 132, and p. 135 - 6. 156 See, for example, the two chapters so titled in Isaiah Berlin, The Roots ofRomanticism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), p. 68 - 117. 157 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 155. 158 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 155 and 165. 159 John Gray, lmiah Berlin, p. 152. 160 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in Eighteenth Century European Thought," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 80 - 1. 161 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 9. 162 Michael Sandel, "Introduction," in Michael J. Sandel (ed.), Liberalism and its Critic (New York: New York University Press, 1984), p. 8. 163 Michael Sandel, "Introduction," p. 5. 164 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 45.
128 129

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Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 46. 166 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 47. 167 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 48. 168 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 54. 169 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 44. 170 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 48 - 50. 171 See, for example, Isaiah Berlin, "The Purusit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 9; and Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 84 and p. 87; indeed, the critique of monism appears to be Berlin's central theoretical preoccupation. 172 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 179. 173 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. 47 - 8. 174 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in Eighteenth Century Thought," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 85. 175 Charles Taylor, Sources ofthe Se(f(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1993), p. 383; also see Charles Taylor, "Atomism," in Shlomo Avineri and Avner de-Shalit, ed.s, Communitarianism and Individualism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 29 50. 176 Charles Taylor, Sources ofthe Self, p. 342.
165

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When one considers how many such facts - habits, beliefs - we take for granted in thinking or saying anything at aH, how many notions, ethical, political, social, personal, go to the making of the outlook of a single person, however simple and unreflective, in any given environment, we begin to realize how very smaIl a part of the total our sciences - not merely natural sciences which work by generalizing at a high level of abstraction, but the humane, impressionistic studies, history, biography, sociology, introspective psychology, the methods of the novelists, of the writers of memoirs, of students of human affairs from every angle - are able to take in. And this is not a matter for surprise or regret: ifwe are aware of aH that we could in principle be aware of we should swiftly be out of our minds. The most primitive act of observation or thought requires sorne fixed habits, a whole framework ofthings, persons, ideas, beliefs, attitudes to be taken for granted, uncriticized assumptions, unanalyzed beliefs .... There is no Archimedean point outside ourselves where we can stand in order to take up our critical viewpoint, in order to observe and analyze aH that we think or believe by simply inspecting it, aH that we can be said to take for granted because we behave as though we accepted it. 1 - Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality" The historical approach is inescapable. 2 - Isaiah Berlin "Political Ideas in the 20th Century

Chapter 3: Berlin's Moderate Historicism 3.i Clashing Natures

There is a particularly troubling apparent inconsistency in Berlin's political thought which the majority ofhis principal interpreters, and particularly his critics, have consistently raised. This tension arises out of Berlin's seeming commitment on the one hand to a historicist, dynamic, interpretive view of human nature as self-transformative and diverse across different historical and cultural 'forms of life' and on the other hand, to a knowable, strictly universal or "a priori" human nature - a nature which necessarily is the same for aIl human beings at aH times. 3 This inconsistency is frequently characterized as Berlin's attempt to "fuse romanticism and rationalism.,,4 Romanticism is seen as connected with a creative and self-transformative view ofhuman agency, and with a historicist approach to human understanding which recognizes constitutive differences between cultures. Rationalism is, by contrast, identified with the systematic discovery and description ofuniversal and basic concepts and categories ofhuman thought and nature.

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Robert Kocis, for example, provides an apt articulation of this widely remarked historicist-universalist tension in Berlin's historical thought: Although he [Berlin] is empiricist and romantic enough to recognize that there are a variety of ways of life and to daim further that they are each valid and equally stable, still he insists that there is an etemal truth about human beings: theyare capable of living life for their own purposes. This vision of humanity becomes a prioristic .... Where Berlin's more empiricist and romantic view ofhumanity as creative suggests a dramatic vision of people facing moral ultimates among which they can only choose, his more universalist view of our purposiveness leads to a daim that sorne values cannot be rank ordered, his more rationalistic vision of people as choosers implies a substantive ethic which values negative liberty as "a truer and more humane ideal" than positive liberty. It is my contention that this conflict which first surfaces in his account of human nature later tears his theory apart, rendering his meta-ethical doctrine of pluralism incompatible with his 5 substantive ethical endorsement of liberty. What Kocis refers to here as Berlin's empiricist and romantic view ofhuman beings as bound up in "a variety of ways of life," 1will refer to as his historicism. 6 Kocis' argument is that beginning from dual conceptions of human nature - on the one hand historicist and dynamic, bound up with the local form of life, and on the other exhibiting certain universal and invariant a priori characteristics - Berlin is led eventually to dual and incompatible moral and political commitments - in effect, to pluralism on the one hand and liberalism on the other. 7 In essence, Berlin's historicist conception ofhuman natures leads to a pluralist orientation according to which human beings must choose among ultimate values without appeal to necessary and certain rational warrants; on the other hand, his universalist commitments lead to a dear rational privilege for negative liberty, and hence to politicalliberalism. "In this way, Berlin attempts a fusion of romanticism and rationalism.,,8 The inconsistency built into human nature finally, in Kocis' estimate, rips Berlin's thought apart. Kocis is by no means alone in raising this concem about Berlin's thought. John Gray points to a similar tension in Berlin's thought. He maintains that a naturalized and quasi-empirical Kantianism in philosophical method is often evidenced in Berlin's thought. But there is an unresolved tension in this conception ofphilosophy, as it is deployed in Berlin's work, generated by the strongly historicist conception of human nature with which it is precariously allied. 9

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Indeed, Gray echoes Kocis is c1aiming to uncover "an a priori element in his [Berlin's] conception of man."I He also writes of quasi-Kantian "universal categories that constitute the common framework of moral thought.... An enduring or constant core in human nature ... from which the universal element of morality springs."!! Gray argues, however, that this commitment to universal Kantian morality conf1icts sharply with Berlin's historicist conception ofhuman nature as "unpredictably self-transforming," 12 and bound up with particular forms of life. Again, the tensions bottled in Berlin' s putative attempt to "fuse rationalism and romanticism,,!3 explode around his political commitments, and particularly his purported (although equivocal) commitment to a traditional universalist liberalism. 14 Moreover, the basic tension is carried over even into Gray's recommended reconfiguration of Berlin's thought, for the uniquely constitutive character he attributes to self-creation through choice making remains a priori, not itself historically or phiiosophically derivable, and not itself subject to change.!5 Kas Mazurek, in an artic1e on "Isaiah Berlin's Philosophy of History," raises the same dichotomy from a different angle. Mazurek points to an apparent contradiction which arises from Berlin's rejection ofmetaphysical and scientific approaches to history on the grounds that they make unwarranted assumptions regarding the underlying truth of human nature. Mazurek portrays Berlin as championing a c1aim that "history is art.,,!6 He then points to Berlin's own seemingly self-contradictory re1iance on knowable 'a

priori categories of human experience:'

Natural science and 'deterministic' theories ofhistory are rejected because they are metaphysical (in assuming the behavior is necessarily wholly orderly and therefore predictable). On the other hand, it is perfectly acceptable to 'assume', a priori, the existence of 'fundamental categories ofhuman experience' in humankind and history.17 Berlin's approach to history is thereby trapped again in a contradiction between his historicist and interpretive orientation and his universalist, or a priori, commitments to
definite moral knowledge.

Indeed, this apparent universalist-historicist inconsistency seems to mark the most widely discussed tension in Berlin's thought. Berlin's purported universalism can take various forms - a priori or naturalist or ethical realist - but these attributions aIl share the common idea of a knowable and certain moral character which inheres in aIl human

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beings or societies as such, and can for the sake of convenience be c1assed as forms of strict universalism. Is Berlin primarily a strict universalist or a historicist, or is he insistently both? Does this unresolved duality 'tear his thought apart'? Liberal interpreters (and many critics l8 ) have characteristicaUy de-emphasized Berlin's historicist commitments, as we saw in the last chapter, and focused on the purported strict universalist component of Berlin's thought as the most direct route to a firm validation ofnegative liberty, and therefore to Berlin's commitment to liberalism. Such a strict universalist reading seems to comport weU with at least sorne key elements in Berlin' s thought. Berlin was indeed a harsh critic, for example, of sorne of the thinkers most c10sely associated with historicism, such as Hegel and Marx. 19 Moreover, he embraced, and even admitted to being inspired by, sorne elements of Karl Popper's famous critique ofhistoricism. 2o Moreover, Berlin sornetimes employed the language of universals, and elsewhere objective human values, ends and duties, even of a common human nature, which seem to run hard against a historicist orientation. Moreover, even if the idea of a strictly universal human nature is problematic in Berlin's historical thought, sorne interpreters, Gray for example, have argued that these commitments can be derived from his philosophical or political thought. There are then important reasons to question the depth of Berlin' s cornrnitment to historicism. Gray himself, however, moves in the opposite direction from liberal interpreters. While he recognizes an important strict universalist element in Berlin's thought, his strong pluralist interpretation nonetheless focuses on a radicaUy historicist reading of Berlin. Ultirnately, Gray recommends that Berlin's thought would be far more coherent and forceful ifitjettisoned aU ofits universalist pretensions (except the idea ofhuman beings as defined by a propensity to radical self-transformation). Berlin, for his own part, denies that there is any debilitating inconsistency in his thought, or that his political ideas and cornmitments lacked an adequate basis?' He
further rejects suggestions that he is trying to fuse rationalism and romanticism in any

general way.22 He does aUow, however, that he is deeply influenced by certain ideas ernanating from both traditions - historicisrn, populism, expressivism, the creative power of imagination and above aU pluralism from the romantic tradition, as weU as certain rational Enlightenment (liberal) ideals, such as the values ofreason, liberty, equality and

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humanity.23 Berlin argues that while many of the romantic critiques of Enlightenment rationalism "reveal truth,,24 he stresses that this does not commit him to embracing their "excesses.,,25 There is much in these critiques which seems to Berlin wildly exaggerated, self-contradictory, implausible. Yet drawing on the strongest and most compelling romantic insights, he demonstrates that one could still formulate a compelling case for sorne Enlightenment ideals, not perhaps in their full form of universal, Enlightenment liberalism, but in the form of a more flexible, historicized, pluralistic liberalism, aIl the more forceful and vital for having surrendered its monistic pretensions, and having taken cognizance of the diversity of particular contexts and cases. In contrast to both of the foregoing readings, I will argue that Berlin's approach to history, philosophy and the humanities in general, is moderate1y but consistently historicist, directed to the most plausible understanding ofhuman history, culture and the present age with its own characteristic experience ofhuman nature. The core ofthis moderate historicist position is a sensitivity to the fundamental diversity of historical and cultural forms of life as unique and distinctive expressive wholes. This sensitivity to diversity is moderated, however, by a sense of the possibility of achieving a degree of insight and understanding into human diversity through the work of the sympathetic imagination. I will argue that this reading coheres closely with Berlin's texts, and allows for a reconciliation of the historicist component of his thought with what he writes of as 'quasi-universal' or 'virtually' universal interpretations ofhuman nature. In other words, the purportedly universalist e1ement of his thought is fully integrated within a moderate and consistent historicist approach. Far from pointing to an unresolved duality which tears Berlin' s thought apart, this reading demonstrates the essential coherence and consistency of Berlin's thought. Moreover, 1 will maintain in later chapters that the moderate but consistent historicist reading leads plausibly to Berlin' s commitments both to strong pluralism, as weIl as to a robust if historicized defence of pluralist liberalism. ln this chapter 1 will concentrate on showing why this moderate hut consistent historicist reading provides a more compelling basis for interpreting Berlin's philosophical and historical views than the strictly universalist views. I will argue that these strictly universalist attributions reflect three important but correctable misunderstandings of Berlin' s thought: first, a confusion of moderate historicism on the one side with

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metaphysical variants exemplified in Hegel and Marx and criticized by Popper; second, an exaggeration of the significance of Berlin's universalist and objective language and his references to human nature; and, third, an unpersuasive account ofhis approach to philosophy and political theory. Berlin's attempts to avoid, and later to clarify, these misunderstandings are apparent both in his essays proper, and in his responses to his critics. The fol1owing chapter is organized into six basic sections. The first section briefly summarizes the general idea ofhistoricism. The second section develops Berlin's moderate and consistent variety of historicism. The third section explores the central idea of sympathetic imagination and the kind ofunderstanding to which it gives rise. The fol1owing three sections consider and reply to potential objections to the historicist reading. The fourth section considers the potential objection that Berlin was a critic of historicism as exemplified in the theories of Hegel and Marx, and a sympathetic ally of Popper's claim of "the Poverty of Historicism." It agrees that Berlin shared with Popper a hostility to what Berlin termed 'metaphysical' historicism, but argues that the object of Popper's critique is clearly distinct from Berlin's own moderate and non-teleological historicism. The fifth section introduces and replies to the objection based on Berlin's universalist and objective language, and his idea of a common human nature. The section argues that on inspection these ideas turn out to be far more rooted, contextual and interpretive than has been generally acknowledged. The sixth section considers the idea that Berlin's strict universalism emanates from his philosophy or political theory rather than his view ofhistory. It argues that Berlin's approach to philosophy and political theory remains essentially historicist, and does not therefore lend support to claims of strict universality. On the contrary, l will argue that Berlin's thought is characterized by a distinctive integration of empiricism on the one hand and imaginative interpretation on the other,
neither ofwhich shows vcry much promise ofproducing certain moral knowledge at ail,

let alone universal knowledge, either independently, or when deployed in 100 se combination. 26 This understanding ofhis historical and political thought helps to explain why Berlin described his life's work as offering a "salutary warning against impatience, bullying and oppression in the name of absolute certitude.',27 Berlin's basic attitude was

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well-reflected in his reaffirmation of Max Born's declaration "Absolute certitude, absolute exactness, final truth... the belief in a single truth, and in being the possessor thereof, is the root of aIl evil. ,,28 Berlin's work, 1will argue, is historicist enough to eschew any general assertions of moral certainty, although he did personally express sorne universal human beliefs, which no doubt contributed to confusing matters. His moral and political thought are couched within what Ignatieff refers to as a "historicized human nature,,,29 although this human nature includes sorne seemingly widespread (quasi-universal) elements which allow for communication across different epochs and cultures. 3.ii Historicism The term 'historicism' is itself importantly contested. In this first section 1 want simply to distill the general meaning, or what Berlin would term the 'basic sense,' of the term. In the next section 1 will focus more specifically on Berlin's own moderate but consistent variation of the basic historicist idea. As Berlin has it, "Historicists hold ... that human thought and action are fully intelligible only in relation to their historical contexts.,,30 The essential kernel of historicism then is a kind of contextual approach to understanding human thoughts and actions: aIl human thoughts and actions - including concepts, values, ideals - are bound up, and enmeshed, at least in the first instance, with their own peculiar contexts, and by consequence are only fully intelligible in the light ofthose contexts. This kernel also has reflective implications for Berlin as weIl - if aIl human thoughts are bound up in a particular historical context, then this will be true of Berlin's ideas and conclusions as weIl, and this militates against what can be called forms of moral realism - that is, claims of certain moral or conceptual knowledge, the objective truth, of even one' s own moral condition. This essential intuition is weIl articulated by Berlin in the first epigram ofthis chapter. Robert D'Amico aptly 'captures' it with the following metaphor: "Historicism is a position about the limits of knowledge, how human understanding is always "captive" ofits historical situation."3l Richard Burian spells out something of the significance of the metaphor of captivity in his definition: [according to historicists] "There are no universally valid methodological and epistemological standards by means ofwhich both science in general and the special sciences [that is, the human or moral sciences] may be evaluated.,,32 Historicist inquiries thus generally flow from within

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a given situated context, and are addressed to a situated context, although in some metaphysical cases these contexts may take on universal significance. What then is the significance ofthis basic contextualist insight? It is two-fold: first, all human thought, values, concepts, ideals, behavior and finally the experience of human nature itself, are potentially subject to change as the contexts with which they are bound up change; second, all human thought, values, concepts, and ideals are potentially contestable, even as human behavior is subject to divergent interpretation, depending on the interpretive context or framework that is brought to bear - thus Burian's repudiation of general validity c1aims, for the grounds of validity c1aims too are bound within historical (and cultural) contexts, each constituting its own gestalt or integrated whole. Berlin derives this basic insight from Vico and Herder: Vico and Herder, despite all their extravagances and obscurities, taught us once and for all that to be a Homeric Greek or an eighteenth century German is to belong to a unique society, and that what it is to belong cannot be analyzed in terms of something which these person have in common with other societies or entities in the universe, but only in terms ofwhat each ofthem has in common with other Homeric Greeks or Germans - that there is a Greek or German way oftalking, eating conc1uding treaties, engaging in commerce, dancing, gesturing, tying shoelaces, building ships, explaining the past, worshipping God, permeated by some common quality which cannot be analyzed in terms of instances of generallaws The unique pattern in terms ofwhich all acts which are German are interlaced We recognize these manifestations as we recognize the expressions on the faces of our friends. The interconnection of different activities which are seen to spring from, or constitute a unique single character or style or historical situation is much more like the unity of an expressive whole, a symphony or a portrait; what we condemn as false or inappropriate is much more like what is rejected as false or inappropriate in a painting or a poem than in a deductive system or a scientific theory, or in the interlinked hypotheses of a natural science. 33 [ia] Human character, values, concepts, ideals and actions are viewed as part of an 'expressive whole,' as contingent on that whole, and as generally subject to change with it. To understand the particulars requires an understanding of the nature of the whole, which we recognize in the same way we do the expression on the face of a friend, or the unity of a symphony or portrait - that is, neither deductively or inductively, but interpretively. Thus, for example, Berlin argues that today "No sane man will quarrel with the thesis that knowledge of historical framework is essential to the full grasp of an

\03

author's ideas.,,34 This historicist focus on diverse and complex expressive wholes as independent contexts of meaning and experience produces serious difficulties for claims ofmoral certainty, unless sorne outside framework, whether metaphysical, teleological or naturalistic, can be introduced to render the diverse forms of life transparent.35 In the absence of such an appeal, historicism limits historical understanding to developing more or less plausible interpretations of the diverse natures of expressive wholes: 36 This is what is called bringing a past age to life. The path is beset by treacherous traps: each age, each group of men, each individual has its own perspective, and these do not remain static, but alter, and this must be understood from such evidence that we have, and no final proof that we have understood, in the sense in which the sciences provide it, is here available. The tests of truth and falsehood ... are what they are in ordinary life, where we do distin~uish between wisdom and folly ... without the employment of scientific criteria. 7 Again then we operate from within a perspective, and have no final proofs about knowing forms of life.
It is this essential focus on context which generates historicists' characteristic

fascination with different periods, phases, stages and patterns of development exhibited different nations, peoples, cultures and civilizations. The patterns of change among forms of life that historicists have identified have been very diverse - as Berlin had it, sorne thought the pattern Static; others thought it was dynamic, but could not agree on whether it moved in recurrent cycles, or a straight, or spiral, or irregular evolutionary line, or by a series of oscillations leading to 'dialectical' explosions; or again, whether it was teleological or functional or causally determined. 38 Whether the patterns of historical change were conceived as one great united pattern, or as diverse and unrelated, whether necessary and deterministic or contingent and unpredictable, one important shared idea was that these diverse contexts, and often their relationship, could be illuminated by a careful historical examination of how they emerged and coalesced, and, in many cases, ultimately collapsed and paved the way for new stages and contexts. The term historicist, rather than say contextualist, probably derives in large part from this idea: the proper understanding ofhuman thought or nature depends on its context, which can in turn be illuminated through historical reconstruction

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- the strategy ofhistorical reconstruction represented its own, distinctive source of understanding, however limited. This represents, 1 think, the essence of Berlin's general understanding of historicism in general. It is a position he quite explicitly draws from Vico, Herder and the romantics, and which stands in sharp contrast Enlightenment universalism. 39

3.iii Berlin's Moderate But Consistent Historicism

Ifwe limit our interpretation of Berlin's historicism to this general idea ofhistoricism, that human knowledge is captive of its own expressive whole, then we will indeed be faced with serious difficulties in understanding how he can affirm general human values or ends or nature at all, for not only are we faced historically with a dizzying diversity of unique forms of life, each of which demands treatment in terms of its own expressive whole, but we also must be cognizant of the myriad impalpable strands of our own form of life, and the manner in which these subtly and often unconsciously shape our own historical and moral judgments and self-understanding. 40 On the other hand, such a general account of historicism provides little insight into the most prominent recent historicists, such as Marx and Hegel, who claimed nothing short of universal moral knowledge. To properly understand Berlin's own historicism, we will have to move beyond the general definition, and consider the different lines along which this basic idea can be developed. The two most outstanding features of Berlin's own methodology immediately stand out and present a puzzle. On one hand, he is explicitly and emphatically 41 empiricist. On the other hand, he places enormous stress on the role of sympathetic imagination as a basis for understanding fundamentally diverse human cultures and historical periods, in essence, for understanding forms oflife. 42 It is not obvious how these concerns relate. 1 will show in this section that the key to their relationship lies in Berlin's moderate but consistent historicism, with its sensitivity on the one hand to
diverse historical pcriods and cultures as distinctive forms of life, fully intelligible only

through an 'inside view,' and with its attention on the other hand to the cardinal importance of consistency with empirical data, rational methods, and verification "to check intuitive certainties.,,43 Berlin, in essence, sees both compelling imaginative interpretation and close consistency and explanatory power in relation to tangible

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experiential and historical data as essential to establishing plausible human understanding. Although he disagrees sharply with Karl Popper on sorne important methodological points, Berlin indicates that "What Karl Popper calls the hypotheticodeductive method plays a central part here," with emphasis on the principle of falsification. 44 Human understanding draws support from both empirical and interpretive sources, but is not susceptible of final verification. It may always be falsified by new data, or supplanted by improved interpretation. The successful defense of a human account over time, or across attempts at falsification may, however, earn it a degree of provisional authority. Berlin's historicism is moderate in the following six senses: (1.) Berlin allows for a partial permeability of expressive wholes through the work of sympathetic imagination and historical reconstuction;45 (2.) Berlin does not deny that there may in fact be universal human values, concepts, ideals, behaviors; he simply maintains that as things stand, we have no definitive means of identifying them with any certainty. He personally believes that there are such universals, but this is a matter of personal conviction; he does not think that they can be demonstrated. 46 (3.) Berlin allows that interpretations of moral life may be more or less consonant with the kind of understanding that we have about ourselves and the world, and particularly with our empirical knowledge. He therefore allows that there may be significantly more and less convincing historical or political interpretations, candidates for human values, and hence more and less persuasive accounts of human nature. With these reservations in mind, Berlin is even willing to go so far as to speak of continuities of categories of experience and quasi-universal values, which appear to demonstrably characterize most known human societies at most times, and that we in particular find it extremely difficult to think or speak coherently without. (4.) Berlin is also willing to acknowledge certain kinds of beliefs which assert universality. In-so-far as we authentically embrace these beliefs and
strive ta give them reality, they may be real universals for us. They nonetheless remain

ultimately matters ofbelief, subject both to contestation and to change, so that however fervently we may embrace them, however convinced we may be oftheir authenticity, they do not allow for any demonstrable moral certainty. (S.) While reason enjoys no a priori status in Berlin's historicism, he does recognize important continuities between

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cultures and periods which complement sympathetic imagination in supporting sorne argumentation and evenjudgement across contextual frontiers. Finally, (6.) Berlin takes up a highly skeptical position in relation to historical determinism, and casts doubt on any objective theory ofhistorical change. In what sense, however, can Berlin's moderate historicism be said to be especially consistent? What l want to draw attention to by introducing this label is how Berlin applies the strictures ofhis moderate historicism without deviation to his own moral and political thought. l will argue that the idea of common human nature which emerges in Berlin's thought is a provisional, interpretive understanding ofhuman nature, like our
understanding ofthe unity ofa symphony or portrait. It emanates from within his

moderate historicist approach, not in contrast or contradistinction to it. This is important both because the main interpretations of Berlin attribute sorne sort of strictly universal claims to him, and because Berlin is frequently accused of vacillation, or selfcontradiction in terms ofhis commitments to universalism and historicism. Where attempts have been made to reconcile his commitments, they have traditionally proceeded by de-emphasizing his historicism or trying to reconcile it with a core universalism. l have suggested that these attempts produce underdetermination and inconsistency. My reading proceeds in the opposite direction, by encompassing his alleged universalism as a provisional interpretation within his moderate historicism. This reading fully reconciles the alleged universalist-historicist tension in Berlin's thought, remains close to his texts, and, as we will see, makes sense of Berlin' s central insights and claims. l will argue that an interpretive view of human nature within his historical understanding is adequate to Berlin's needs of explaining the possibility of sympathetic imaginative reconstruction and supporting particular inter-cultural and inter-historical moral and political judgments. On the moderate historicist reading then, Berlin's thought, contrary to the former readings, is always situated, always interpretive, always modest and never
strictly universalist in the sense of claiming certain knowledge about human thought,

action or nature in general. This modesty is exemplified in Berlin's allowance that, for example, both relativism and determinism 'may weil be true. ,47 His argument is against their persuasiveness from where we stand, particularly in terms of "the normal thoughts of ordinary men on this topiC.,,48

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The most important element in Berlin's moderate variant ofhistoricism is the idea of sympathetic understanding. It is this component of his thought, and the partial permeability of forms of life which it introduces, which provides the key to understanding the status of the comparatively stable elements in his view ofhuman nature and morallife. It, therefore, deserves more careful attention. 3.iv Sympathetic Imagination and Understanding Berlin develops the idea of sympathetic understanding and the related distinction between natural scientific knowledge and human studies in his essay on "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities" in which he argues that Giambattista Vico originated this great division according to which we still think today by illuminating a fundamental methodological and epistemological distinctions between those inquiries concerned with natural objects and those focused on human constructs: about the external world there was something opaque: men could describe it, could tell how it behaved in different situations and relationships, could offer hypotheses about the behavior of its constituents - physical bodies and the like; but they could not tell why - for what reason - it was as it was, and behaved as it did: only he who made it, namely God, knew that - men had only an outside view, as it were, ofwhat went on the stage ofnature. Men could know 'from the inside' only what they had made themselves and nothing else. The greater the man-made element in any object of knowledge, the more transparent to human vision it will be .... 49
o

The difference between natural and human inquiries then is wrapped up with an outside/inside distinction, but in what sense can one hope to get 'inside' the human objects of inquiry? Vico argues, and Berlin concurs, that human activities, artifacts and institutions - "works of art, political schemes, or legal systems" - and particularly human history, can, when properly approached, reveal a great deal about the people who engaged in and produced them. They tell "the story ofhuman activities, ofwhat men did and thought and suffered, ofwhat they strove for, aimed at, accepted, rejected, conceived, imagined, of what their feelings were directed at. ,,50 Here human beings were the central "actors, not spectators." Through human actions, institutions and arts, other human beings can achieve a special imaginative empathy with, and understanding of, these distant human actors and their forms of life.

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Vico insists that "we possess a faculty that he calls jntasia - imagination - with which it is possible to 'enter' minds very different from our own,,,51 so that "With regard to ourselves we were privileged with an 'inside' view.,,52 In essence, the exercise of imaginative empathy can achieve a special insight into human beings and the distinct forms of life they inhabit. This understanding, however, is sharply distinct from 53 scientific knowledge of facts or logical truthS. Berlin observes that Herder would later develop a very similar notion of Einfuhlen or 'sympathetic empathy.' 54 Einfuhlen provided a means by which Herder is able to penetrate - 'feel himself ... into their essence, grasp what it must be like to live, contemplate goals, act and react, think, imagine in the unique ways dictated by their circumstances, and so grasp the patterns of life in terms of which 55 alone such groups are to be defined. This possibility of sympathetic understanding is for Vico, Herder and for Berlin an essential distinction of the human inquiries in general. Berlin emphasizes two primary means of extending this sympathetic understanding outwards, both central to the disciplines of human inquiry. First, he embraces Herder's notion of expressionism - "the doctrine that human activity in general, and art in particular, express the entire personality of the individual or group, and are intelligible only to the degree to which they do SO.,,56 The contemplation of art, and especially great art, and other historical artifacts, institutions, records, expressions, and actions can provide bridges allowing one to 'enter into' lives, perspectives and contexts very distant and different from one's own. In his article on Herder, Berlin suggests that this kind of imaginative reconstruction could be seen as akin to an expressive theory of language or an inward theory of acting. 57 It is like transposing oneself plausibly into a role defined by certain lines, ideas, actions and reactions by linking these together into an integrated 'character.' Berlin (and later Taylor)58 celebrates this as one of Herder's great contributions to Western thought. The second primary strategy of sympathetic understanding is through careful historical reconstruction of the emergence, or development, or genealogy of contexts, of the way that "aims [values, concepts] are necessarily related to social change or growth, and to the emergence of social rules and ways of life that are themselves largely due to the influence of the environment and social change.,,59 It is in this latter sense that Berlin
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is willing to accept the sobriquet with which Robert Kocis describes him - as a "nonteleological developmentalist,,,60 a writer deeply concerned with patterns of development and change (not necessarily progressive) as a means of illuminating diverse contexts of life and thought, but who eschews the imposition of any general teleological or metaphysical pattern or scheme of predetermination on the patterns which emerge. Indeed, Berlin questions the whole notion that there is any neutral, non-situated position from which an objective pattern could be apprehended: " ... no historical writing which rises above the bare chronicler's narrative, and involves selection and the unequal distribution of emphasis, can be wholly wertfrei.,,61 He insists that "... neutrality is also a moral position," or e1sewhere, "detachment is a moral position."62 As the epigram suggests, Berlin believes that there is no known Archimedean point from which forms of life can be viewed. His position is, in its essence, that human thought has, to the best of our knowledge, no certain means offully escaping its particular context. It does, however, have a interpretive means of pursuing better understandings of historical periods and diverse cultures, and by reflection of its own distinctive character - here, "the historical approach is inescapable. ,,63 What is important is not to abstract from history and cultural diversity into 'thin' scientific generalities, but to enter into them. Both means of exercising sympathetic imagination, through expressivism and historical reconstruction, and in particular their integration into a convincing whole, however, draw deeply on aesthetic judgments from which they cannot be separated To do this, one must possess imaginative power to a high degree, such as artists and, in particular, nove1ists require. And even this will not get us far in grasping ways of life too remote from us and unlike our own. Yet even then we need not despair, for what we are seeking to understand are men - human beings endowed, as we are, with mind and purposes and inner lives - their works cannot be wholly unintelligible to us .... Without the power ofwhat [Vico] describes as 'entering into' minds and situations the past will remain a dead collections of objects in a 64 museum for US.
Berlin emphasizes the need for an artistie insight into Wirkingzusammenhang, the

"general structure or pattern of experience" with its complex and intimate internaI 65 relations. The need to reach an understanding of these complex internaI patterns involves a great deal of interpretation, and again aesthetic judgment:

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History, and other accounts of human life, are at times spoken of as being akin to art. What is usually meant is that writing about human life depends to a large extent on descriptive skill, style, lucidity, choice of examples, distribution of emphasis, vividness of characterization, and the like. But there is a profounder sense in which the historian's activity is an artistic one. Historical explanation is to a large degree arrangement of the discovered facts in patterns which satisfy us because they accord with life - the variety of human experience and activity - as we know it and can imagine it. That is the difJerence that distinguishes the humane studies - Geisteswissenscha.ften - from those ofnature. When these patterns contain central concepts or categories that are ephemeral, or confined to trivial or unfamiliar aspects ofhuman experience, we speak of such explanations as shallow, or inadequate, or eccentric, and find them unsatisfactory on those grounds This kind ofhistorical explanation is related to moral and aesthetic analysis In this sense, to say of history that it should approximate to the condition of a science is to ask it contradict its essence. 66 [ia] In explaining this complex process of interpretation, Berlin even introduces the idea of "imponderables," and a "faculty ofjudgment," which is neither inductive nor deductive: This, indeed, is why we speak of the importance of allowing for imponderables in forming historical judgments.... Recognition of the fundamental categories of human experience differs from both the acquisition of empirical information and deductive reasoning. 67 The profound embededdness ofthis component of aesthetic judgment in the humanities militates strongly against certainty in the interpretation ofhistorical periods and divergent cultures, and thus against the possibility of reconciling historicism with strict universalism. "History," for example, "is not identical with imaginative literature ... [but] it is certainly not free from what, in a natural science, would be rightly condemned as unwarrantably subjective and even, in an empirical sense of the term, intuitive.,,68 The foregoing passages are drawn primarily from Berlin's essay on "The Concept of Scientific History" in which his central purpose is to confront and discredit the title concept. His argument here, as the last line above suggests, is that historical study is a representative humanity, and thus of a different character than natural science,
and not translatable into it. Nonetheless, both actual means of exercising sympathetic

imagination demand close correspondence with the facts as known - in the expressionist case, with the art, the records, the institutions and customs, the actions and events, the language, concepts, values and gestures that characterize the culture in question; in the developmentalist case, correspondence is with the chronological flow of the facts as

III

known. In both cases what Berlin is concerned with is not the exercise of imagination in general, but a specifically scholarly exercise which must remain "tethered to reality by unification of the facts as in any natural science.,,69 The range and depth of the facts, records and artifacts convincingly incorporated within a given explanation remains an essential empirical baseline in human studies according to which interpretations can be assessed and compared, and in many cases on the basis of which judgments may be made. The ultimate baseline of Berlin's history begins with the empirical- "direct confrontation with the concrete data of observation and introspection.... ,,70 On the other hand, the imaginative reconstitution of the facts into a coherent whole can also be assessed comparatively. We can make strong judgments about "great" and "superficial" interpretations of forms of life and their experience of human nature, and back such judgments with clear and demonstrable reasons, which will, at least in many cases, prove convincing. As much as Berlin insists that there are irreducibly artistic and evaluative components that guide human studies, he does not for that reason lapse into relativism - a reduction ofinterpretive differences to issues oftaste.

In essence, Berlin writes of three broad criteria of the adequacy of historical and
cultural understanding: (one) how well can a given historical or cultural understanding make sense of the records, facts and artifacts as they are known; (two) how effectively does its narrative structure fit with the larger cultural or historical framework; (three) how well does the understanding fit with our imaginative sense of what "human beings, as we understand them, could have felt or thought or done" at a given time and place, in essence, to their distinctive nature. 71 Evidently, these criteria provide only a crude baseline according to which we can assess historical interpretations. In sorne cases, they may guide persuasive judgments, but there may be plenty of competing interpretations which may meet the criteria and still disagree profoundly. At this point, they must compete in terms of cohesion, explanatory force, range, compatibility with new data and other salient considerations. Sometimes a stronger account can at length he widely agreed upon, sometimes we must live with multiple competing accounts. In essence, the activity ofhistorical reconstruction through sympathetic imagination leaves the question of best interpretation open-ended, even while recognizing the strengths of particular accounts.

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The essential point to which 1want to draw attention here is that there is a good deal ofroom for understanding the quasi-universals to which Berlin appeals through the lens of his moderate historicism. That is, the kinds of general values and common nature to which he refers are in fact empirically-grounded interpretive points of continuity which seem regularly to appear across successive acts ofhistorical and cultural reconstruction as aspects of particular human natures, and hence are from the beginning deeply evaluative and interpretive, and ultimately rooted within the form of life from which the imaginative reconstruction springs. Ifthis is the case, then these quasi-universals are not wellunderstood as strict universals. They are better understood as tentative and interpretive categories, fully falsifiable, and subject to change. If this is the case, then there need be no deep tension between these categories on one hand and Berlin's historicism on the other. They flow naturally out of Berlin's human inquiries. 3.v Moderate and Metaphysical Historicism
It might be objected at this point that Berlin could not have been a consistent

historicist in the sense 1have described because he was also c1early a harsh and persistent critic of the most prominent historicists, like Hegel and Marx. Furthermore, he evinced a great deal ofsympathy with Popper's critique ofhistoricism. 72 Moreover, ifhe was a historicist, as 1 suggest, this would make him subject to Popper's critique. In response to these objections, 1 will distinguish Berlin's moderate historicism from what he characterizes as the 'metaphysical' historicism exemplified in Marx and Hegel and critiqued by Popper. This latter historicism seeks to overcome its initial historical embededness and contingency and to achieve strictly universal knowledge of human thought, action and nature by appealing to theories of historical determimism. 1will argue that Berlin's moderate historicism is sharply distinct from, and incompatible with, the variants developed by Hegel and Marx. Indeed, it is against Hegel and Marx and their latter day interpreters, against whom Berlin launches sorne of his
most potent attacks. 73 The incompatibility can, Tthink, begin to be brought out by a brief

examination ofPopper's critique. Far from being the unhappy object ofPopper's critique ofhistoricism, Berlin warmly embraces a number ofPopper's most salient arguments: No one has demonstrated this with more devastating lucidity than Karl Popper. While he seems to me somewhat to underestimate the differences between the methods ofnatural sciences and those ofhistory or common sense ... he has ...
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exposed sorne of the fallacies of metaphysical 'historicism' with such force and precision, and made so c1ear its incompatibility with any kind of scientific empiricism, that there is no further excuse for confounding the two ....74 [ia] Berlin embraces Popper' s critique of metaphysical historicism, but distinguishes this from historicism proper. Eisewhere Berlin affirms "1 use the term [e.g., historicism] not in Karl Popper's sense, but in the more usual sense employed by Meinecke, Troeltsch and Croce.,,75 Popper defines the historicism he wants to criticize as follows: [historicism is] an approach to the social sciences which assumes that historical prediction is their principal aim, and which assumes that this aim is attainable by discovering the 'rhythms' or the 'patterns', the 'laws' of the 'trends' that underlie the evolution of history. 76 As Popper convincingly argues, this approach must rely on the accessability of "universal laws (which it tries to discover)."n It should be c1ear from this that the historicism that interests Popper is a very different kettle offish from Berlin's variety. Berlin wholeheartedly shares Popper's conviction that there is no compelling reason to accept metaphysical historicism and, in particular, its central c1aim that universallaws of human nature and development are accessible to us. There are, moreover, good reasons to doubt it. First, Popper famously reprises Hume's contention of an empirical gap - in essence, that the empirical inquiries in which science (in his view both natural and human) engages fall short, even at their most successful, from providing grounds of certainty. This is a point on which Berlin also lays stress, and which leads away from epistemological standards of final verification, and to the idea of hypotheses as continually subject to falsification. The best case scenario for a knowledge c1aim is that it successfully resists manifold efforts at falsification. On-going success in such resistance may eventually enhance a c1aim's plausibility, but it cannot establish its validity beyond further challenge, as an indisputable 'universallaw.' As Popper puts it, This has sometimes been called the hypothetical-deductive method or more often the method of hypothesis, for it does not achieve scientific certainty for any of the statements which it tests, these statements always retain the character of tentative hypotheses, even though the character oftheir tentativeness may cease to be obvious after they have passed a great number of severe tests. 78 This is an important argument, which reflects Berlin's own empiricist disposition, and his skepticism about certainty. It not only militates against the presumptive c1aims of

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metaphysical historicism, but equally naturalism, ethical realism, and a priori attributions.
It is fully consistent with the character of Berlin's moderate historicism.

Popper offers a second basic reason for rejecting metaphysical historicism: My reasons are very simple. The evolution oflife on earth, or ofhuman society, is a unique historical process .... Universallaws make assertions concerning sorne unvarying order... and although there is no reason why the observation of one single instance should not incite us to formulate a universallaw, nor why, ifwe are lucky, we should not even hit upon the truth, it is clear that any law, formulated in this way, must be tested by new instances before it can be taken seriously by science. But we cannot hope to test a universal hypothesis nor to find a natural law acceptable to science if we are forever confined to the observation of one unique process. Nor can the observation of one unique process help us to foresee its future development. 79 In essence, nature provides only one general case of human history at any particular juncture, so that the basis of empirical evidence it provides is too thin to effectively test any universal generalization, let alone universallaws. There is only limited opportunity for falsification. Again, this insight militates against daims of presumptive strict universality. On the other hand, it does not predude universal truths in principle, or even the possibility ofhitting on them through empirical inquiry, only of the definitive daim to have done so. Again, this is fully consistent with Berlin's moderate historicism. The last comment ofPopper's argument regarding the limited foreseeability of future developments suggests an argument more fully fleshed out by Berlin: One of my deepest beliefs is that one of the causes of continuous change in human history is the fact that it is precisely the fulfillment (or partial fulfillment) of sorne human aspiration that itself transforms the aspirant, and breeds, in time, new needs, new goals, new outlooks, that are ex hypothesi unpredictable; and that this is one of the main objections to the view that it is possible to discover rigorous laws of social change, and its corollary, a knowable causal determinism. 80 ria] Beyond the central argument against historical predictability and determinism, and consequently against metaphysical historicism, it is worth noting, first, that in this passage Berlin does not deny the inherent possibility of universal laws, but rather their being "knowable" to us, and, second, that Berlin emphasizes the possibility of unpredictable human transformation, of new needs, goals and outlooks. The latter point contrasts with Popper, who sees humans as essentially similar across historyY

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Berlin also develops a consequentialist argument against historical prediction and determinism which finds sorne echo in Popper.82 In essence, Berlin argues that once sorne final stage or condition is embraced as the appropriate and necessary destiny for mankind (or a specifie group), then the goal of the accomplishment of this condition effectively supersedes other values. In essence, whatever authority must be exercised now, whatever sacrifices made, in order to reach the collective destiny, their justification will be clear in retrospect once the 'the other shore,' or final stage, is reached: So 1 conclude that the very notion of a final solution is not only impracticable, but, if 1 am right, and sorne values cannot but clash, incoherent also. The possibility of a final solution - even if we forget the terrible sense that these words acquired in Hitler's day - turns out to be an illusion; and a very dangerous one. For if one really believes that such a solution is possible, then surely no cost would be too high to obtain it.... that was the faith of Lenin, of Trotsky, of Mao, for all 1 know of Pol Pot. Since 1know the only true path to the ultimate solution of the problem of society, 1 know which way to drive the human caravan; and since you are ignorant of what 1know, you cannot be allowed to have liberty of choice even within the narrowest limit, if the goal is to be reached. 83 The claim to know others' moral goods or destinies better than they do potentially justifies all sorts of atrocities. Berlin emphasizes that the unfortunate consequences of adopting such a view have been all too clearly illustrated in this century.84 Berlin further raises three more important arguments against what he terms 'metaphysical' historicism, first that historical determinism is incompatible with sorne of our most basic moral and political concepts and values, particularly the idea of free will and individual moral responsibility (and hence our moral language in general); second there are irreducible artistic and interpretive elements in any substantial historical reading which militate against claims of certainty in defining the historical contexts which inform human thought and actions. Berlin's historicism eschews this possibility, third, because it is profoundly anti-empirica1. 86 These arguments again refrain from claiming that
85

determinism must in itselfbe false, but limit themselves to the claim that it is not demonstrable from our situated position. 87 Berlin's argument is simply that the onus of proof on such arguments is very high. 88 So, Berlin's moderate historicism provides a wide range of reasons to reject 'metaphysical' historicism and claims to strict universality and historical prediction

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more generally. Moreover, it is not vulnerable to the main objections Popper raises against metaphysical historicism. Berlin's thought then travels a long way with Popper's critique of 'metaphysical' historicism, perhaps even beyond it. Nonetheless, sorne of the crucial differences have also already been implied, beginning with Popper's insistence that the object ofhis critique is historicism in general, while Berlin sees it rather as merely one comparatively implausible 'metaphysical' variant. Moreover, it seems evident that one may hold many of the positions that Popper attributes to historicists, such as a holistic rather than an atomistic method,89 or a beliefthat human nature "or the laws of sociallife, differ in different places and periods,,,90 that "they depend upon history, and upon differences in culture .... They depend on historical situation,,,9\ and still not embrace universallaws ofhuman development or grand predictive theories or conceptions of the human telos. There is also an important difference in the intention of their critiques - where Popper wants to discredit historicists once and for all as 'enemies' of 'the open society,' Berlin cautions us of the weaknesses and dangers ofthese 'metaphysical' positions, but he does not seek to dismiss them and exclude them from 92 serious discussion, but to learn from them - indeed, almost the entirety of his career is taken up precisely with struggling with thinkers of this description, and in virtually every case, despite his reservations, he also finds a great deal he recognizes as original, 93 insightful and true. Moreover, Berlin and Popper split sharply over Popper's methodological naturalism, that is, his insistence "that all theoretical and generalizing sciences make use of the same method, whether they are natural or social sciences. ,,94 From Berlin's perspective this emphasis on a single method makes Popper subject to a charge of an empirically unwarranted monism. The essential point that is illustrated by this brief comparison with Popper is that while Berlin has at least as potent an arsnal of arguments against 'metaphysical' historicism, he quite explicitly remains a historicist of a consistent if moderate variety
himself. Perhaps the best brief summary of his position cornes in a final passage "The

Divorce between The Sciences and the Humanities": The only way of achieving any degree of self-understanding is by systematically retracing our steps, historically, psychologically and, above all, anthropologically, through the stages of social growth that follow empirically discoverable patterns, or, if that is too absolute a term, trends or tendencies with whose workings we are

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acquainted in our own mentallife, but moving to no single, universal goal; each a world on its own, yet having enough in cornmon with its successors, with whorn it forms a continuous line of recognizably human experience, not to be unintelligible to their inhabitants. Only in this fashion, if Vico is right, can we hope to understand the unity of human history - the links that connect our own 'magnificent times' to our squalid beginnings in 'the great forest of the earth.'95[ia]

3.vi Universal Values, Objectives Ends and Common Human Nature

A further objection to the moderate but consistent historicist reading can be raised on the basis of sorne key expressions in Berlin' s writing. Berlin writes of (1) a common human nature, (2) basic concepts and categories ofhuman moral experience, (3) universal or basic human values, and (4) objective values and ends. Each ofthese may reasonably appear to present a challenge to a consistently historicist reading, with its emphasis on diverse natures. Indeed, they largely form the basis for strictly universalist readings of Berlin. l will argue, by contrast, that when they are nuanced by Berlin's view of interpretive understanding as the focus of the humanities, and their provisional status is recognized, they can be seen not only to be consistent with his moderate historicism, but to flow directly from it. It should be c1ear from the beginning, however, that the point is not to show that Berlin has no view of common human nature, basic concepts or categories ofhuman experience, or ideas of general human values or objective ends, but only to show that his account of them is far more modest, tentative, interpretive and subject to change than is generally allowed, and, most importantly, that they each flow out of a particular, historicized view of human nature. The overall argument then is that Berlin's language should be understood as describing imaginatively and 'empirically discoverable patterns,' or 'trends and tendencies,' not something assumed in advance, or with necessity or certainty. The important question at this point is the form and justification ofBerlin's idea of quasi-universal human nature, not its contents. Berlin's notion of a general human nature is comprised of two basic groups of elements: (1) a physical or biological inheritance which is loosely connected with the basic categories of human experience, and (2) universal values and objective ends or values. Berlin's central argument for the existence of sorne kind of common nature immediately appeals to his moderate historicist account of sympathetic imaginative

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understanding, and at the same time distances itself from presumptive strict universalism:

... insofar as communication between human beings is possible, across time and space as well as within individual communities, this is based on a common human nature (or outlook) which alone makes this possible. This is, for me, an empirical generalization of the factors that make human intercourse possible. It is not an a priori metaphysical Platonic truth. 96 [ia]
This is, for me, an empirical generalization of the factors that make human intercourse possible. It is not an a priori, metaphysical Platonic truth. For that reason 1 do not feel guilty of crypto-Platonism, smuggled into myempirical 97 , P1ural lsm ... This is a key point in Berlin's understanding ofhuman nature, and one to which he continually returns. What is essential to note here is that his rationale is an empirical argument based on the experience of imaginative reconstruction across a range of particular cases. In other words, his case for human nature is built squarely from the beginning on his idea of historicist understanding. The primary evidence for the existence of sorne sort of common human nature is that moderate historicist communication and understanding does seem generally possible across particular historical epochs and cultures, as weIl as within highly diverse forms oflife. To the degree that such communication and understanding is tentative, interpretive, and subject to falsification, supersession and change, these reservations extend to the idea of a common human nature as weIl. This line of argument does not lead to strictly universalist knowledge of human nature, but rather to a modest historicist interpretive and empirical understanding. If the specifie components of Berlin' s understanding are investigated more c1osely, this modest, historicist character will be reflected in varying degrees. The physical aspect of human nature cornes c10sest to a simply empirical grounding. As the focus shifts to moral categories, objective ends and universal values, the interpretive component ofhistorical reconstruction becomes increasingly evident. Points of physical similarity may be taken to be the most stable across time and culture, and yet, Berlin argues that even "such stability is a matter of degree." AIl our categories are, in theory, subject to change. The physical categories - e.g., the three dimensions and infinite extent of ordinary perceptual space, the irreversibility of temporal processes, the multiplicipity and countability of material objects - are perhaps the most fixed. Yet even a shift in these most general characteristics is in principle conceivable. 98

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Moreover, when we turn to the Ioosely connected basic categories, Berlin is explicitly clear that even these core features human nature are known only empirically, in-so-far as they appear to be comparatively continuous: Kant supposed these categories to be discoverable a priori. We need not accept this; this was an unwarranted conclusion from the valid perception that there exist central features of our experience ... at least much less variable than the vast variety of its empirical characteristics and for that reason deserve to be distinguished by the name of categories. 99 The physical categories mark comparatively stable, empirically perceptible, characteristics of human nature, still subject to change. Mere physical similarities, while supportive, do not themselves explain the possibility of communication - after all, human beings and chimpanzees show extensive genetic similarity. Any sympathetic understanding of a distant form of life must also rely on sorne meeting points in terms of moral and political categories, values and concepts. Such features are to be found in the moral and political and social worlds too: less stable and universal, perhaps, than in the physical one, butjust as indispensable for any kind ofintersubjective communication, and therefore for thought and action. 100 [ia] Moreover, as we move away from the purely physical categories, towards moral ones, the reconstructive role of sympathetic imagination becomes increasingly central to the empirical enterprise, even more so as we move to values and objective ends. Immediately, however, Berlin introduces an element of added complexity, for the core of common human nature itself is not understood simply, but as a shifting nucleus: [All men are] endowed with a nucleus ofneeds and goals, a nucleus common to all men, which may have a shifting pattern, but one whose limits are determined by the basic need to communicate with other similar beings. IOI Kas Mazurek derides Berlin because he "does not attempt to describe this 'common nucleus' (after all, it has a shifting pattern), nor will he make clear its determined limits.,,102 It is true that Berlin's discussion of common human nature never moves beyond the fragmentary. The reasons for Berlin's reticence seem to be two-fold: in the first place, while the apparent evidence of communication and understanding provides sorne reason to believe that there are common moral categories, values and ends, it

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does not provide any certain means of identifying what these categories, values or ends actually are. In the second place, actual sympathetic reconstructions reveal enormous disparities in conceptions and relations even of the most basic moral categories. 103 The most basic categories, like reason, moral agency and human imagination will be formulated differently, and with quite diverse relations, across human cultures and epochs. A moderate historicist orientation is sensitive to this diversity. The idea of a loose shifting core of human nature, penetrating down to the level of the basic categories, offers a means of accommodating both this basic diversity and the limited and interpretive nature of our apprehension ofthem. Berlin's reluctance to offer a comprehensive statement of human nature and its limits which so frustrates Mazurek reflects a moderate historicist disposition - asserting on one hand that we have evidence towards at least sorne common human nature, but by the same token, we have reason to be reserved in trying to finally and comprehensively define it, for it is diverse, complex and subject to transformation, and our own efforts are always interpretive, falsifiable, subject to supersession. To summarize thus far, Berlin suggests a two-tiered empirically and interpretively-grounded view ofhuman nature which, even at its core, remains largely undefined, shifting, and continually subject to change. Berlin's suggestion seems to be that in practice, despite whatever differences there may be among particular human natures, there will generally be enough similarity to allow for human communication. Already this does not have the anticipated sound of a strictly universalist view of human nature. The historicist character of his understanding of human nature becomes more evident as we move away from the basic categories and towards what Berlin writes of as objective and universal values. The central role of imaginative reconstruction is particularly c1ear in the case of what Berlin terms objective values. Berlin writes,
The common is what is correctly called objective - that which enables us to identify other men and other civilizations as human and civilized at aIl. When this breaks down we do cease to understand, and, ex hypothesi, we misjudge; but since by this same hypothesis we cannot be sure how far communication has broken down, how far we are being deluded by historical mirages, we cannot always take steps to avert this or discount its consequences. We seek to

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understand by putting together the fragments of the past, make out the best, most plausible cases .. .. \04 [ia] What is objective is not what is necessarily true or immutable but what is common in the sense ofbeing commonly identifiable in 'other men and other civilizations.' Objective values are primarily characterized by imaginative recognizability, although we cannot always be strictly certain how far such recognizability actually extends, and how far we merely imagine it. What is essential here is the degree to which objectivity is reliant on an "effort of the imagination" leading to "recognition." As Berlin has it elsewhere, Each man or society places a higher value on certain ends of life than on those of others, the values ofwhich must, nevertheless, be capable ofbeing recognized even by their bitterest adversaries - that is what is meant by saying these ends are objective human ends, that is, such that any human being can, by a sufficient effort ofthe imagination, see how such ends, however low in his own scale of values, can come to be pursued by men, perhaps in societies and situations and with inclinations very different from his own, yet unquestionably human - that is, creatures with whom he could, in principle, achieve communication .. .. 105 [ia] This is a sense of objectivity far removed from the more familiar sense of being certain, definite or final. It is a peculiarly historicist conception of objectivity which retains an important element of interpretation. The historicist sense of objectivity then conveys a general recognizability, an imaginatively perceptible pattern, rather than certainty or strict universality. Moreover, Berlin maintains that there is a range of such objective values which can conflict in given cases. He characterizes the objective values and ends thus provisionally identified as "the objective, often incompatible, values of mankind between which it is necessary often to choose.,,106 Berlin's idea of objective values in no way supports a strictly universal or a priori view ofhuman nature. Objectivity marks an ideal ofunderstanding we can have no certain means of attaining. In an interview with Stephen Lukes, Berlin affirms that none of the values that he discusses could be said literally to attain to objectivity - "pluralism is
as near to objective values as 1 can get.,,\07 He uses the term then loosely ta designate

values which he interprets as achieving very general potential recognizability. Two further features that Berlin connects with objective values or ends which will become especially important later deserve mention here. In essence, objective values overlap with what Berlin terms ultimate values in two basic respects. 108 In the first

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place, Berlin insists that objective ends are "ends-in-themselves," they are "ends that men pursue for their own sakes, to which other things are means."I9 Moreover, he emphasizes that objective ends flow directly from basic models or particular concepts of human nature. 110 Objective values are those which are recognizable, ultimate ends, which flow directly out of plausible and recognizable concepts of human nature. If, however, objective human values or ends do not attain to strict universality, but only to empirical and interpretive generality across most particular forms of life accessible to us, it may yet be that Berlin's idea ofuniversal human values will provide stronger support for a strictly universal human nature, and will therefore mark a limit to Berlin's moderate but consistent historicism. It is, after all, the idea ofuniversal value which seems most proximately implicated in Gray's 'universal element of morality, , or Ignateiffs 'universal moral law, , or Kocis' 'a priori' conception ofhuman nature. These strong interpretations of universal human values, however, immediately run into difficulties. Berlin asserts unambiguously "how universal and basic human values are, / feel no certainty." 111 [ia] Moreover, Berlin almost inevitably qualifies the idea of universal values as quasi-universal or virtually universal. l12 What then does Berlin mean by 'universal human values'? He employs the expression in a loose, dual sense of strong belief and general description - that is, to indicate a value people feel strongly today and which appears to find resonance with people at most times and most places. In the first, or generally descriptive sense, Berlin continually points out that his meaning here is mainly empirical (or "quasi-emirical" 113) and loosely descriptive (rather than asserting a necessary and unalterable fact) - some features of human existence seem to be characteristic of 'virtually' all known cases, but this does not establish necessity (quite the opposite if there are indeed exceptions) or prec1ude potential falsification or human change: No culture that we know lacks the notions of good and bad; true and false. Courage, for example, has so far as we can tell, been admired in every society known to us. There are universal values. This is an empirical fact about mankind, what Leibniz called verites du fait, not verites de la raison. There are values that a great many human beings in the vast majority of places and situations, at almost all times, do in fact hold in common, whether consciously and explicitly or as expressed in their behavior, gestures, actions .... 114 From that it does follow that this is virtually a universal fact about mankind: but not an a

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priori form of rational knowledge .... These are general truths, but this does not assume anything unalterable. l cannot guarantee anything against change. 115 ria] We lean on the fact that the laws and principles to which we appeal, when we make moral and political decisions of a fundamental kind, have, unlike legal enactments, been accepted by the majority ofmen, during, at any rate, most of recorded history .... 116 [ia] Quasi-universal values then are those which seem to have been felt, whether selfconsciously or not, by a great many people at a great many places, across diverse societies, distinctive forms of life within a general human horizon - but not strictly universally. Eisewhere, Berlin defines the human horizon as follows: What l mean by "the human horizon" is a horizon which for the most part, at a great many times and places, has been what human beings have consciously or unconsciously lived under, against which values, conduct, life in aIl its aspects, have appeared to them. But l cannot guarantee that this will go on forever, or has never been absent or altered in the past - l can only say that not only am l for it, but that the great bulk of mankind, whatever its differences and conflicts, do, in fact, accept this as a minimum required by human solidarity - in terms of which human beings tend to recognize each other as such. This is not Platonism, if is an empirical, undemonstrable, de facto acceptance ofwhat, if seems to me, human . experzence prOVl'des. 117['] la Such objective duties, then, are empirical (as matters of experience) on the one hand, but also finally undemonstrable on the other (as matters of interpretation). They are defined on the one hand by one' s own convictions, emanating from one' s own sense of what 'human experience provides,' and by interpretive correspondence within a broad, although not strictly universal, human horizon, which can be interpretively plumbed to a certain depth through imaginative inquiry. Such duties remain potentially subject to change both at the level of one's own experience, and at that ofhistorical reconstruction. Moreover, the mode of inquiry into the values of diverse periods and cultures remains historicist, empirical and interpretive, and hence gives rise only to tentative, interpretive conclusions. Further, the human universals uncovered are diverse and often oppositional, and not even necessarily conscious, so that provisional quasi-universal values remain contestable. Finally, the universals thus discovered remain subject to change. 118 Berlin offers in these passages a forceful expression of his best interpretation.

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Berlin's position then, even when he occasionally employs the language of quasiuniversality, is far more limited in its sense, far more provisional and flexible than many of his interpreters and critics have allowed.
119

Indeed, Berlin argues in sharp contrast to

the positions attributed to him, that there can no absolute or certain knowledge of necessary human universals. 120 The human quasi-universal values represent general interpetive and empirical, historical patterns, not strict universals. There is also a second sense in which Berlin employs the expression "universals": "1 don't think there is such a thing as a direct non-empirical knowledge, intuition, inspection ofeternal principles. Gnly universal human beliej'i.,,121 These take the form of encompassing statements about human beings which extend beyond the boundaries of what can be empirically observed or demonstrated, but in the light of which people nonetheless live. Berlin's distinctive existential sense of universality is suggested in his comments in an interview with Ramin Jahanbegloo in response to the question "But you believe in moral mIes?": LB.: Yes, in a sense: 1 believe in moral values which a great many people, in a great many countries, for a very long time have lived by. This acceptance makes it possible to live together. But ifyou say "absolute mIes," then 1 have to ask you "what makes them so?", and "founded on what?" That returns to the a priori again. If you mean by universal an intuitive certainty of these mIes, 1 think that 1 do feel a kind ofintuitive certainty, but if you tell me the somebody else has a quife difJerent outlook, set ofintuitions, 1 can, unless they are unintelligible, with an effort, grasp how someone might come to have such values. . .. But 1 am quife clear that 1 do not have the faculty which detects absolute moral rules. Somebody like Leo Strauss believes in them because he believes in a faculty which sorne call "reason" .... Strauss' reason detects absolute values. 1 envy him. Ijust don 't happen to have that kind ofreason.. 122 RJ.: But you don't deny [universal] human rights?
LB.: No, 1 deny a priori lists ofhuman rights. 1 believe passionately in human

rights; this follows from a great deal else that we accept, but if is not demonstrable a priori.... Ifyou tell me that one day we will have a difJerent culture, 1 can 't prove the contrary.123 [ia] Here Berlin indicates a kind of intuitive certainty that he and others may feel about universals, of certain things being integral to human life as we know it, which, while often similar, may differ, sometimes even irreconcilably. In-so-far as these beliefs may be constitutive of who we are, they have a reality and validity that we give them, and are
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in this sense valid universals. In-so-far as they are sincerely believed, and internalized, in-so-far as they become integral to real historical identities, they attain to a type of reality. Still, universal beliefs, like human nature, are subject to transformative change, and even a pattern across forms of life provides no guarantee this will go on forever, or has never been absent or altered in the pasto Elsewhere, Berlin offers as an example of the reality and power of such universal beliefs, the cases of many Europeans who resisted the German occupation in the early 1940s: Men stood up, as they had always done, and became martyrs for their beliefs, and were admired for it, at times even by those who destroyed them. They were tortured and died for principals which, so at any rate they believed, were universal and binding on all men, part of the human essence in virtue of which men were rightly called men. They could not break these principles, without feeling that they had forfeited al! right to human respect. They could not betray them and face themselves and others. For this reason the appeals to realism made to defeated countries in 1940 by victorious German leaders ... failed to break the spirit ofthose who truly believed in universal human values. Sorne resisted in the name of universal ideals enshrined in churches, or national traditions, or objective knowledge of truth, other stood up for goals which were none the less sacred because they were individual and private to their possessors. This dedication to ideals, irrespective of their 'source' ... has an affinity with . . .. th e mo dern eXlstentlal'ISt posItln.... 124 Berlin goes on to argue that this represents the grain of truth in modern existentialism that sorne values are made by our commitments, they are an empirical aspect of our human experiences, although this makes them no more objective or immune to clash than any other values in which we may believe, in fact, quite the opposite, for they are brought to consciousness primarily by conflict with other similarly held universal values. This is the existential moment that Berlin himselfrecognizes in his work. 125 Berlin declared in an interview, "In a sense 1 am an existentialist - that's to say 1 commit myself, or find that 1 am in fact committed, to constellations of certain [specifie] values.,,126
It is at the moment that we internalize a value that it becomes, in a sense,

objective, for it exists, in us, as a living part ofus. These are empirically (in the case of one's own) and imaginatively (in the case of others') perceptible universal moral values. Berlin makes just this point with his World War II example, and then goes on to emphasize that these basic ideas are not to be taken literally as 'objective and

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universal', but that we use this language to capture the wide scope of the daims and the depth of our commitment to them: "When these principles are basic, and have been long and widely recognized, we tend to think ofthem as universal ethicallaws .. .. ,,127 [ia] The kinds of values we refer to when we speak of universal human values, or indeed concepts, are the kinds of things that we think of as constitutive of what it is to be a human being. Berlin's point is that these rules are made by us, and are breakable by us, as they could have been broken by those who insteadjoined the resistance, but only at the cost of our own basic sense of what it is to be human, of our own identities. What is essential is that "The ideals of individual human beings commanded respect and even reverence, even if no guarantees of objective validity could be provided." 128 "Civilization," he writes, "means that you must allow the possibility ofchange without ceasing to be totally dedicated to - and ready to die for - your ideals as long as YOU
believe them.,,129 [ia]

Universals, Berlin suggests, as we colloquially use them are generally integrations of these two limited senses of universality concepts and values which have which have

both a wide historical and cultural resonance and which we wish to endorse normatively, to assert for ourselves. In-so-far as we invoke broad cultural and historical resonance, however, we must perforce rely on the re-constructive role of the sympathetic imagination, so that another level of interpretation unavoidably enters our assessment. In-so-far as quasi-universal values are asserted as our own normative beliefs, subjective, interpretive and imaginative components again enter. Berlin argues that there is a range of such universals that human beings could quite reasonably assert in this sense, and indeed, there is a range of universals to which modern Europeans do empirically appeal: For the fact of shock reveals that there does exist a scale of values by which the majority ofmankind - and in particular Western Europeans - in fact live, live not merely mechanically and out of habit, but as part of what in their moments of self-awareness constitutes for them the essential nature of man. 130 Where descriptive quasi-universal values and normative universal beliefs are at their strongest and most plausible, where they at once seem to find the widest cultural and historical resonance, and at the same time seem to constitutively inform our most basic moral language and thought, and particularly our understanding of human nature, we find what may be described as the provisional quasi-universal human values. Still, these
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values emanate first and foremost out of particular understandings of human nature, what

'constitutesfor them the essential nature ofman.'

There is thus in Berlin's work both a kind of empirical universality or 'virtual universality' of description based on historical understanding, and a sort of existential, creative universality which appears as a deeply-held belief. Neither ofthese, nor their combination, will correspond with the kind of strict universality that critics have attributed to Berlin. He does not deny that universal values in this sense, are possible, even perhaps likely. Indeed, he believes in them. His argument is that we have no 'magic eye' which aHows us to distinguish them with any permanence or certainty.131 Having looked more carefuHy at the components of human nature, we can affirm that this view of human nature develops through, and not outside of or against, his moderate historicism. Both the idea ofhuman nature, and its internaI notions of quasiuniversal human values, and objective ends, are presented, upon inspection, as imaginative and empirical generalities characterizing the majority of particular cases as understood through historicist inquiry. Indeed, Berlin's thought seems to exhibit an inverse mIe ofthumb in regard to certain or a priori daims in regards of humanity in general. Where our potential insight is strongest is in regards to particular cases rather than in general daims: When aH is said and done, we are never too sure - not even the wisest of us - of what is good for men; in the end we can only be reasonably sure of what it is that particular societies and individuals crave for ... 132 For it seems to me that, in the end, aH that we can know is what specific men in fact hope and fear, love and hate, ask for and reject .... 133 Interpretive confidence is highest in relation to particular cases, and diminishes as we begin to generalize. Moreover, Berlin's comments on sympathetic imagination and objectivity suggest that confidence in our insights diminishes with the distance, dearth of empirical information, and unfamiliarity with the particular form of life in question. Correspondingly, interpretive expectations rise as levels of empirical evidence and familiarity increase. It is in interpretation of recent particular cultural and historical forms oflife, and indeed our own, where we can be 'reasonably sure' of ourselves. This mIe ofthumb again militates against the attributions of strict universality to Berlin's

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view ofhuman nature, and again affirms this view as a tentative and interpretive historicist view. Moreover, what this view leads to is a 'reasonably' confident interpretation of diverse historical experiences ofhuman nature within particular forms of life, in short a historicized view of human nature, with certain loose points of general continuity perceptible across cases. Berlin's concept ofhuman nature is a composite ofphysical traits, categories of moral experience, and values or ends in terms of which men are believed to live. This concept of human nature constitutes one of the ultimate presuppositions, perhaps even the 134 Berlin argues that the exercise of central one, in terms of which people live. sympathetic imagination and historical reconstruction illustrate that even such ultimate presuppositions are "destroyed or transformed by those changes in the total outlook of man or a milieu or a culture which it is the hardest (and the most important) test of the history of ideas to be able to explain."135 Berlin approvingly refers to Herder on this point: Values - ends - live and die with the social wholes of which they form an intrinsic part. Each 'collective individuality' is unique, and has its own aims and standards which will themselves inevitably be superseded by other goals and values - ethical, social and aesthetic. Each ofthese systems is objectively valid in its own day .... 136 In other words, central features of human nature inc1uding common values and ends "vary from age to age and from culture to culture.,,137 These changes "transform the aspirants." Indeed, it is the transformations in the ultimate presuppositions which define such changes of epoch, or differences between cultures. Each form of life contains its own objective values and goals, its own "unique pattern" of specifie values potentially recognizable to virtually everyone within the cultural or historical horizon, and which find expression in diverse total or whole experiences ofwhat it is to be human. These values enter so deeply into our sense of human nature that they are "intrinsic to the way in which we think." To deploy our idea ofhuman nature "is ipsofacto to bring aIl these notions into play.,,'38 It is in this light that Berlin asserts that human beings are "unpredictably self-transforming" creatures. In recognizing that human nature itself is subject to transformative change, Berlin follows Vico and Herder, who, in Ignatieffs words, "historicized human nature .... [by showing that] each culture had its own center of gravity - what Herder called its Schwerpunkt.,,139 Berlin affirms that " ... there is
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something called human nature. 11' s modifiable, it takes different forms in different ,,140 cultures .... Berlin's focus on historicized human nature reflects a deep romantic influence on his thought. Still, Berlin modifies the romantic heritage in two essential respects. First, as Mark Lilla argues forcefully, he places far greater emphasis than Vico or Herder on the internaI strong pluralism which frequently characterizes historical and cultural

Schwerpunkt. 14 \ Second, he allows for greater continuities across particular epochs and
cultures than what he terms the "unrestrained" romantics, such as Nietzsche, Fichte and Hamann. He maintains, "Some of these [generalities] apply to mankind over sufficiently long stretches oftime to be regarded as virtually universal.,,142 Indeed, these continuities may reflect truly universal human values, although we have no means of achieving certainty about it. Correspondingly, the purpose Berlin's attributes to humanistic, and particularly historical investigation is simply not directed towards establishing universal and certain propositions about human nature. He understands this purpose rather as follows: "The whole value of discovering the past and studying other cultures is to understand more, so that you understand yourselfbetter.,,143 Humanistic and particularly historical investigation is ultimately directed not towards universal human knowledge, but to better understanding a particular form oflife, specifically one's own, and the underlying particular experience of human nature that informs it. It is on this point, as will be seen below, that Berlin's historical thought meets his philosophical and political thought. When considered carefully in context then, Berlin's references to (1) a common human nature, (2) categories of human moral experience, (3) quasi-universal human values, and
(4) objective values, do not betoken strictly universal c1aims of moral certainty, but mark

points of relative continuity perceptible within a moderate historicist program - they mark tentative interpretive and empirical shared points which allow communication, understanding, perhaps even judgment between particular human cultures and periods.

3.vii Berlin's Philosophieal and Politieal Thought

On some interpretations of Berlin's thought, a strictly universalist element derives from his philosophical or political thought instead of from his historical investigations or his approach to the humanities in general. Suggestions of this view have already been

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seen in Gray's talk of Kantianism in Berlin's philosophical method, leading to universal categories of moral experience: "By a mode of thought Berlin caUs philosophical ... we can identify the common structure ofhuman thought about moral matters .... ,,144 For Galipeau, this distinction runs so deep that these two aspects of Berlin' s thought may be ultimately at odds - "Berlin the historicist may be at odds with Berlin the philosopher of liberalism." 145 My thesis is that Berlin's approach to political theory is continuous with moderate but consistent historicism. It marks essentiaUy a projection of moderate historicism inwards, focusing on communication and understanding 'within individual communities, ' here into the internaI dynamics of the modern Western form of life. It relies, as we will see, on the presence of an internaI moral and political pluralism, on an internaI diversity of distinct and sometimes rival moral and political basic models informed by particular concepts of human nature within that specifie form of life. It focuses again on sympathetic imaginative interpretation and understanding, rather than on definite forms ofknowledge. AU of the aesthetic, evaluative and imponderable elements thus recur in Berlin's theoretical methodology. Similarly, the 100 se baseline of empirical consideration of which basic models have to make sense, and the possibility of better and worse interpretations, reappear in his philosophical and political thought. This section willlay out a very briefsummary of Berlin's approach to political theory, and then pursue four basic lines of argumentation against its connection with strictly universalistic accounts of human nature, at the same time showing why his philosophical thought is better understood as moderately historicist. In essence, Berlin's philosophical and political thought is (l) concerned primarily with basic models and concepts of human nature characteristic of particular forms of life, most notably that in which it occurs (in this case in the modern Western form of life), (2) reliant on the interpretive work of the sympathetic imagination, (3) explicitly critical and evaluative in orientation in a manner whieh leaves its conclusion always tentative and self-criticaL and (4) potentially revolutionary and transformative in a manner which precludes strictly universal human knowledge. The first task then is to briefly summarize Berlin's approach to philosophy and political theory. The first point that needs to be made concerns the relationship of the

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two. Berlin uses the terrns political philosophy and political theory interchangeably.146 Moreover, he regards ethics, social philosophy, and political philosophy as subdisciplines of moral philosophy differing not in terms of their methods or concerns but in their specific object domains. "Political theory," Berlin writes, "is a branch of moral philosophy, which starts from the discovery, or application, of moral notions in the sphere ofpolitical relations.,,147 While the object domain of Berlin's political theory is distinct from social theory or individual ethics, he nonetheless, like Ronald Dworkin for example, demands a high degree of continuity between moral, ethical and political thought. 148 The sphere of application is different, but the essential content is indivisible. As Berlin writes, " ... despite every effort to separate them, conducted by a blind scholastic pedantry, politics has remained indissolubly intertwined with every other form of philosophical inquiry." 149 Berlin defines his basic approach to political theory as follows: The first step to the understanding of men is the bringing to consciousness of the model or models that dominate and penetrate their thought and action.... The second task is to analyze the model itself, and this commits the analyst to accepting or modifying or rejecting it, and, in the last case, to providing a more 150 adequate one in its stead. The process then is repeated, so that new models too are subject to scrutiny.151 Ultimately, Berlin insists that political problems are about what men and groups should be or do, and depend logically and directly on what man's nature is taken to be. 152 For Berlin, then, the first step in philosophical thought inc1uding political, is to draw out basic models and their directive concepts of human nature. Berlin's approach to examining basic models and concepts ofhuman nature begins with particular philosophical questions. These questions Berlin defines in contrast to empirical questions, which are answerable "by observation and by inference from observed data," and formaI questions, which are answerable "by mere calculation," through purely logical or mechanical operations. Philosophical questions, by contrast, are those which "we are not c1ear how to set about trying to answer," concerning which we do not "know along what lines to proceed." l53 Such questions "reduce the questioner to perplexity.,,154 They are stubbornly troubling or controversial. Indeed, "once we do feel quite c1ear about how we should proceed, the questions no longer seem

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philosophical.,,155 By consequence, as Berlin has it, "There can be in it [i.e., philosophy] no orthodoxy." 156 Defining philosophy in this way begs the question 'what causes such perplexity?' Berlin argues that "philosophical problems arise because concepts and words and thoughts and ways of formulating and arguing about the world and about oneself corne into special sorts of collision.,,157 These concepts, words and thoughts that collide are parts of the 'models that penetrate men's words and thoughts' to which Berlin refers in his overall summary of the philosophical endeavor. More specifically, he maintains that values and concepts" ... are ... deterrnined by models, networks of categories, descriptive, evaluative and hybrids compounded of the two, in which the two functions cannot be disentangled even in thought.. ..,,158 These hybrid models are composed of "second- or higher-order statements about whole classes of descriptions of, or responses to, the world and man's activities in it ...." These models and networks of concepts, categories are embedded within forms of life: [philosophical] problems depend to a much greater extent than scientific or mathematical ones upon the particular ways ofthinking, on the particular sets of concepts and categories, prevailing in a given culture or language in a given . ar . country at a partIcu1 tIme. 159

In essence then, Berlin emphasizes the importance of "models or paradigms," often

"shadowy or confused," even unconscious, "shaped by the strongest influence ofthe day," which determine "the content as well as the form ofbelief and behavior.,,160 At the core of such models, particularly as they relate to politicallife, lie basic concepts of human nature. 161 When the values and concepts which are encompassed within these diverse models corne into conf1ict over particular problems, the result is the 'special sort of collisions' which give rise to perplexing philosophical problems. These collisions and problems are unstable, but nonetheless revealing of the models and lives in which they arise: "Life changes, so do the ideas, so do the collisions.,,162 In these cases of collision, the different basic moral and political models do not support any obvious common overarching principle, hierarchy of values or technique of resolution. Berlin's approach to philosophy in general and political philosophy in particular focuses on using these points of aggravated dispute and perplexity to begin to trace and reveal the underlying models of thought which characterize the particular form of life in
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which they occur, in the contemporary case, to illuminate "the main political doctrines of the [modem] West.,,\63 Once brought to light, these models and their underlying concepts are subjected to critical scrutiny and comparison. 164 This is done in two ways which can be characterized using Kuhnian terms as normal and revolutionary !: . 165 lunctlons. In what may be called its normal pursuit, philosophy and political theory examine and critique basic models and concepts of human nature with a goal of clarification and understanding, and above all towards greater particular selj:understanding: " ... 1 think that se(f-understanding is one ofthe main purposes ofphilosophy.,,166 [ia] Political philosophy is an examination of the ends of life, human purposes, social and collective. The business of political philosophy is to examine the validity of various claims made for various social goals, and the justification of the methods of specifying and attaining these. Like ail philosophical inquiry ft seeks to clarify the words and the concepts in which these views are framed, so that people come to understand what it is that they believe and what their actions express. 167 [ia] Ultimately, this self-understanding of framing concepts points to particular concepts of human nature. In sorne cases, this more acute understanding may lead to the possibility of moving towards resolution of troubling philosophical questions. 168 In other cases it reveals irreducible difference. In either case, deeper understanding allows one to act, choose, argue and judge for reasons that are c1ear, or at least c1earer. By contrast, the revolutionary function consists, as 1 will develop below, in proposing new, alternative ideas and models which can persuasively transform entire outlooks. This brief overview leads us to the first point which needs to be made about Berlin's approach to political theory. It is primarily concerned with the moral and political mode1s in circulation within given forms of life. In this sense, it begins from a historicist assumption - that each form of life, each cultural or historical epoch will to a large extent be characterized by its own distinctive, stubbornly perplexing moral and political problems, and will house its own distinctive basic moral and political models and its own range of concepts ofhuman nature. Berlin's approach to moral and political philosophy is directed towards a c1earer understanding of the internaI intellectual landscape of such forms of life, and most particularly one' s own. Far from providing any

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firm basis for strictly universal human nature, it seems to suggest that human nature will form the focal points of on-going and irreducible philosophical controversies. The second argument concerns the issue of how basic models, their underlying concepts of human nature, and indeed entire hybrid constellations of ideas are to be understood. 1 have suggested that such understanding begins from particular philosophical problems arising at a particular time and place, but this only carries us as far as the provision of basic materials. How can these be understood as total and cohesive orientations? Here Berlin has recourse again to the central moderate historicist idea of the re-constructive sympathetic imagination: But unless we understand (by an effort of imaginative insight such as novelists usually possess in a higher degree than logicians) what notions ofman's nature (or absence ofthem) are incorporated in political outlooks, what in each case is the dominant model, we shall not understand our own or any human society.... 169 [ia] As with his historical thought, this reliance on interpretive recreation introduces aIl of the aesthetic and imponderable elements into his basic philosophical methodology which undermine the epistemological foundations for strict universals. In this case, however, imaginative reconstruction is directed not towards diverse forms of life, but towards diverse basic models within given forms oflife, most importantly one's own. The third point moves beyond the exposition of basic models, values and concepts to emphasize that both the content and dynamics of political theory are themselves inherently evaluative and normative and consequently consonant with better and worse interpretations but not with certainty. Berlin characterizes the basic moral and political models which are the main subject of political theory as descriptive-evaluative hybrids, composed of diverse, descriptive-evaluative concepts and values. Berlin, for example, identifies the "most fundamental of aIl political questions," and the most stubbornly recurrent, as "why should anyone obey anyone else?" And he argues that when we ask why a man should obey, we are asking for the explanation of what is normative in such notions as authority, sovereignty, liberty, and further justification of their validity in political arguments. 170 These concepts and values are themselves not neutral, for they make daims about what the relevant criteria should be, and thus appeal to more general models and concepts. On

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the other hand, whatever common kernel may be perceptible in such ideas, their full significance "will be radically dissimilar for theists and atheists, mechanistic determinists and Christians, Hegelians and empiricists, romantic irrationalists and Marxists, and so forth.,,17} In other words, the questions that concern the political characteristically evoke normative and contested concepts and values. These offer a rocky bed to daims of strict universality. Political theory, as Berlin has it, "cannot, from the very nature ofifs interests, avoid evaluation." [ia] These evaluations remain interpretive and contestable. Moreover, these concepts and values are continually subject to change along with underlying basic models: "These central conceptions, moral, political and aesthetic, have themselves altered as the aU-inclusive metaphysical models in which they are an essential element have also altered."I72 ria] Given its fundamentally unstable and evaluative content, political theory is better understood as contributing to a deeper understanding (of the type that Berlin connects with the humanities in general) rather than the sort of certain, factual knowledge that might give rise to strictly universalist or morally certain knowledge ofhuman nature. Finally, at its most heroic and revolutionary, philosophical or theoretical inquiry may help to transfigure basic language and thought. Part of the critical role of philosophy is to contrast existing models with alternatives which make better sense of the empirical evidence, of what 'human beings are, can be, have been.' Sometimes, new ideas, basic models and concepts ofhuman nature proposed by philosophers can have, in time, transformative influences on existing structures of thought. As Berlin has it, "concepts nurtured in the stillness of a Professor's study could destroy a civilization."173 In Berlin's thought, philosophy is innately revolutionary because it is always concerned with testing, and sometimes knocking down, the prison walls of established thought. Philosophy is an attempt, and has always been an attempt, to find ways oftalking which cause a transformation of outlook sufficient to alter radically attitudes and ways of thought and speech, and in this way solve or dissolve problems, redistribute subjects, reformulate and reclassify relationships between objects, and transform our vision of the world. 174 "The principal function of philosophy at its best is to break through, liberate, upset." 175 It does this by bringing the basic foundations of our own thought and character suddenly before our eyes, and then subjecting these foundations to the possibility of revision:

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... a philosopher. .. is bound to subvert, break through, destroy, liberate, let in air from outside .... Because philosophy at its most effective consists in radical transpositions of this type ... its effect is necessarily in the direction of wider freedom, of upsetting of existing values and habits, of destroying boundaries, transforming familiar contours, which is at once exhilarating and disturbing. 176 Because philosophy, including political philosophy, is peculiarly concerned with "radical transpositions ofthis type," Berlin is particularly suspicious of any attempts to constrain, or presumptively define, its range, method, and content. His own method, like his conclusions, is always tentative, flexible and multifaceted. Indeed, Berlin insists that philosophy and political theory and indeed the arts and humanities in general, far from establishing universals, a prioris or certain knowledge, are practices which demand continuaI renewal, continuaI reconsideration: This, as in the an analogous case with the arts is something that can only be performed within each generation separately, for the vision of one generation must always, if formulated in words, frozen into techniques, established as an orthodoxy, become a prison house for the next or next but one; and therefore no 'progress' in the precise sense can be expected; each generation requires its own osteopathie operation, its own insights, its own self-liberation, its own powerful men of genius to transfigure its vision, establish new relationships, new differences. l77 This continuaI revolutionary activity, this continuaI breaking down of cognitive prisons, of frozen techniques and presuppositions, hardly seems calculated to produce strict universal categories, or certain moral knowledge, but points again to Berlin's historicism. Moreover, aU of these interpretive, evaluative, and transformative elements lead Berlin to take a particularly modest and cautious interpretive view of philosophical understanding. As he insists, "A certain humility in these matters is very necessary." 178 In sum then Berlin's approach to both philosophy in general and political theory in particular exhibit the same approach he brings to history and indeed the humanities in general, the same sensitivity to distinctive forms of life, the same focus on interpretation and understanding through a combination of sympathetic imagination and interpretation, on evaluation balanced by continuaI self-criticism and attempted falsification. In essence, Berlin's philosophical and political thought represent an inward application of his moderate historicism to the diversity of models and concepts of human nature which he sees characterizing our contemporary form of life, with a primary goal of deeper self-

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understanding. On this reading no universal a priori views of human nature or moral certainties arise from Berlin's philosophical and political thought. Berlin philosophical, political and historical methodologies exhibit an essentially similar moderate historicist approach which militates against the possibility of 'Berlin the historian being deeply at odds with Berlin the philosopher.'
3.viii Conclusion

A consistently moderate but historicist reading of Berlin's work coheres well with Berlin's texts, and offers a means ofresolving what is perhaps the most persistently troubling tension or alleged inconsistency in his thought - specifically that arising between his commitments to historicism and his alleged appeal to strictly universals particularly in connection with human nature. Contrary to first appearances, Berlin' s attitude to historicism, his language, and his political thought all pointed to a historicist rather than a universalist orientation. This reading suggests that Berlin's view of quasiuniversal human nature can be read as an historical interpretation arising out of diverse exercises in historical reconstruction. Berlin' s view is then grounded in a mixture of imaginative interpretation and empiricism, neither of which alone or in combination will support a priori daims, naturalism, ethical realism or certain moral knowledge. Berlin's view of common human nature is offered as a candidate for best understanding all things considered. It is then fully falsifiable, supercedable, and subject to change. It is nonetheless adequate to his limited purposes of offering an explanatory basis for the apparent possibility of inter- and intra-cultural and historical communication and understanding, and of providing sorne basis on which particular judgments can 'lean.' How well this moderate but consistent historicist reading lines up with Berlin's substantial moral and political commitments has not yet been broached. These views will form a subject of Chapter 5. Already it offers, however, at least a partial answer to his critics. In response to Mazurek's concern about a contradiction, for example, Berlin might observe that the difficulty he expresses with metaphysical, teleological and a priori views is the anti-empirical imposition of a pre-determined pattern on history. His own view of human nature arises simply out of perceptible continuities and patterns without imposing any necessary structure. For this reason, he does not fall prey to his own critique. Moreover, this open-ended, moderate historicist account ofhuman nature

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helps to explain his "maddening" reticence to give a definitive account of it. Finally, it is evident that his view of history is not simply as art, but as a partially aesthetic interpretive discipline always 'tethered' to empirical evidence. In response to Gray he may answer that to read him both as a historicist and an ethical realist or Kantian philosopher embraces rather than answers the charge of a fundamental contradiction in his thought. Such a reading is necessitated neither by his historical nor his philosophical methodology or thought. This interpretation offers neither an attractive nor a necessary reading. Similarly he may reply to Kocis that there is no a priori view of human nature in his thought to contradict his historicist one. If he suggests that human beings are purposive creatures, it is simply that they have been so with great persistence, so much so that this idea has entered widely and deeply, even quasi-universally into understandings of human nature. Indeed, they have been so with such persistence that this idea has become integral to what we mean by human beings. Berlin does not make claims about what human beings must he, now or in the future, but simply about what we, from our situated position are able to recognize as fellow creatures. This is a question of the limits of communication and understanding for us, as things stand, not of metaphysical essence. This answer would not yet necessarily clear Berlin of charges of a tension between his liberalism and his pluralism, but it would at least show that the tension was not rooted in two distinct and incompatible foundational accounts ofhuman nature. The moderate historicist reading offers a consistent, clear, and well-supported approach to reading Berlin. It provides a plausible answer to the most important and persistent charge leveled at his work. It fits well with the distinctly historical orientation of his thought and writing, and with his persistent protests of modesty. It offers, in essence, a promising approach to understanding Berlin. Finally, it points to the central importance of identifying Berlin' s particular view of human nature and the basic model of moral and politicallife that it informs in arder ta fully understand his moral and political thought.

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Notes

Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality, p. 15 - 6. Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 4. 3 Robert A. Kocis, "Reason, Development and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision ofPolitics," American Political Science Review, Volume 74, Number 1 (March 1980), p. 39; C.l Galipeau, p. 121; and John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 24although Gray's views are more fully described p. 66 - 70 as quasi-Kantian universal categories ofhuman moral experience. 4 Robert A. Kocis, "Reason, Development and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision ofPolitics," p. 38; Isaiah Berlin, "Toward a Coherent Theory of Moral Development," p. 372; John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 119 - 20, and p. 156 -7. 5 Robert A. Kocis, "Reason, Development and the Conflicts of Human Ends: Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision ofPolitics," p. 39. 6 Although the attribution of 'equal' stability seems a bit exaggerated. It seems better to say that each achieves a requisite leve1 of stability. 7 In another article, Kocis extends this to a three-fo1d layering ofhuman nature, featuring universa1ist, romantic and developmentalist components - Robert A. Kocis, "Towards a Coherent Theory of Moral Development: Beyond Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision of Human Nature," p. 371 - 5. 8 Robert A. Kocis, "Towards a Coherent Theory of Moral Development: Beyond Sir Isaiah Berlin's Vision of Human Nature," p. 372. 9 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 163. 10 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 24. Il John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 66. 12 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 9, 23 - 4, 66 - 7, 74, 120, 142. 13 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 156 -7 and 119 - 120. 14 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 141 - 151. 15 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 24 - 5. 16 Kas Mazurek, "Isaiah Berlin Philosophy of History: Structure, Methods, Implications," Philosophy and Social Criticism, Volume 6, Number 4 (1979), p. 393. 17 Kas Mazurek, p. 402. 18 This is exemplified in the universal burdens Ignatieff sees Berlin taking on - Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 286; also see, for example, Charles Taylor, "P1urality of Goods," in the Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 117 - this attribution allows Taylor to argue what I take to be Berlin's own position against him on p. 118 - 9. 19 See, for example, Ramin Jahanbeg100 (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 21, 34 and p. 38; also see Isaiah Berlin, "The Decline ofUtopian Ideas in the West," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 44 - 5; and Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau "Atheneum Interview," Taped Interview, 1 June, 1988, p. 9 - 10; and Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 92; Isaiah Berlin, "Attitude on Marxism Stated: Dr. Berlin Amplifies his Remarks Made at Mount Holyoke," New York Times, 8 July, 1949, p. 18; and, as Berlin indicates at these last two junctures, Berlin's "Two
1 Isaiah

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Concepts of Liberty," was intended quite specifically as an anti-Marxist, anti-Hegelian treatise. 20 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 92, p. 98. 21 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 389 - 90, p. 393 or Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to West," p. 297 - 8, or "Reply to R.H. Mckinney," p. 559 or "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 389 - 90, and p. 393. 22 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 388 - 9. 23 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 70 - 1; and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty," p. lvi; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," and Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 200 - 206. 24 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 71. 25 Isaiah Berlin, "the Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 579; and, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p.197. 26 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 24. 27 Isaiah Berlin, "Three Strands of My Life," p. 6. 28 Isaiah Berlin, "Three Strands of My Life," p. 6. 29 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 245. 30 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century European Thought," The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 77. 31 Robert D'Amico, Historicism and Knowledge (New York: Routledge, 1989), p. x-xi. 32 Burian quoted in D'Amico, p. xii. 33 Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," The Sense ofReality, p. 19 - 20. 34 Isaiah Berlin, "Hobbes, Locke and Professor Macpherson," Political Quarterly, Volume 35, p. 446. Berlin goes on to argue that communication, especially in terms of great philosophical ideas and works and great art, is still possible across periods - thus, his moderate historicism. This Berlin sees in contrast to what he criticizes as Macpherson's "extreme historicism." 35 Berlin, in referring to the Historicism of Herder and Vico, writes " ... such historicism was plainly not compatible with the view that there was only one standard of truth or beauty or goodness, which sorne cultures or individuals approached more c10sely than others, and which it was the business of thinkers to establish and men of action to realize." Isaiah Berlin, "The Counter-Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 247 - 8. 36 Isaiah Berlin, "the Counter-Enlightenment" in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 247 8. 37 Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality, p. 25. 38 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 78; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 126. 39 Nonetheless, Berlin's basic understanding ofhistoricism is quite plausible, and consistent with a great deal of the tradition and scholarship on the matter. Consider, for example, the four following definitions offered by important contributors on the debates surrounding historicism.

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The quotes are drawn from (i.) Joseph Margolis, (ii.) Maurice Mandelbaum, (iii.) Terence Tice and Thomas Slavens, and (iv.) from Georg Iggers and F.R. Ankersmitt: (i.) According to historicism the nature of a thing lies in its history. (ii.) It [historicism] is only to deny that the fruits ofhuman inquiry are, in any principled sense, ever conceptually unaffected by historically developing forms of inquiry itself. (iii.) Historicism is the belief that an adequate understanding of the nature of any phenomenon and an adequate assessment of its value are to be gained through considering it in terms of the place it occupied and the role which it played in a process of development. (iv.)[Historicism is] to view human events in their singularity, (2) to try to understand the diverse relationships of these events to general but changing patterns or to evolutionary trends, but in a dynamic and concrete manner, (3) to examine aIl human products in this historical fashion, and (4) to affirm for such inquiry, and sometimes for the social sciences generaIly, on this basis - a scientific status distinctly different from the natural sciences. (Joseph Margolis, "Historicism, Universalism, and the Threat of Relativism," Monist, Volume 67 (July 1984), p. 310; Maurice Mande1baum, History, Man, Reason (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1971), p. 42; Terence Tice and Thomas Slavens, Research Guide to Philosophy (Chicago: The American Library Association, 1983), p. 428 - 9; Georg Iggers, "Comments on F.R. Ankersmitt's Paper 'Historicism: An Attempt at Synthesis," History and Theory, Volume 34 (1995), p. 162. Berlin does affirm this type of historicist inquiry as the characteristic methodology of the human sciences (whose discovery was one ofVico's great contributions), and interpretive understanding it produces in contrast to the systematic knowledge of the natural sciences. (Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 351 - 8, and Isaiah Berlin "Vico's Concept of Knowledge," in Against the Current, p. 113 - 9). The central theme of aIl of these definitions is that to properly understand a thing, especially a human thing, like an idea, involves an understanding of its context and consequently its history. This demand also reflects back on the seeker of understanding, requiring an understanding of his own history if he is to understanding his own learning, his own context, and himself. Both subject and object then, to employ old but familiar terminology, are caught up in changing historical contexts, which intrude everywhere, colouring everything. A great deal depends, then, on how we understand history, both our own and that of others. l think that this represents Berlin's essential understanding of basic historicism. 40 Indeed, there is a sense in which a general historicist view seems to undermine itself for could it not be that the whole propensity to view human history through the lens a sequence of unique and distinctive forms of life is actually a mere manifestation of our own unconscious values and commitments. Such an approach surely leaves us not only bereft of universal moral certainties, but of any confident historica1 knowledge at aIl. 41 Defined as, "any doctrine founded on knowledge derived from experience ofwhat men are and seek;" (Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," The Proper Study ofMankind, p.225); e1sewhere, "questions whose answers depend, in the end, on the data of observation" (Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," Concepts and Categories, p.

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2); also see, Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 32, 39, 152, and Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 4. 42 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 85, 87; Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of The Ideal," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 8 - Il; Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 346, 351, 354 - 6; Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, 369,389,405, and p. 426 - 8. 43 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin. p. 39; Berlin emphasizes that verification is also a central concem for Vico - Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 64. 44 Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality, p. 33. 45 Berlin accepts sorne modem criticism ofVico's method, and consequently his ambitious c1aim that historical periods can be "wholly understood." Nonetheless, he maintains that the exercise of sympathetic imagination remains central to historical method and to the humanities in general - Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 63 - 4 and p. 68 - 9. 46 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 106 - 110; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Mckinney," p. 557 - 9. 47 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Pursuit ofMankind, p. 161, also see 147. 48 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Pursuit ofMankind, p. 163. 49 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 342. 50 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 342. 51 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 346. 52 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 343. 53 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept ofScientific History," pA7, 50 - 53 - 4; Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 354 - 7. 54 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightnment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 405,426. 55 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 389. 56 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 367; see also, Tsaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 393. 57 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 406. 58 Charles Taylor, "The Importance of Herder," in Edna and Avishai Margali (ed.s), L'Wiah Berlin: A Celebration, p. 40,47,55 - 6; also see Charles Taylor, Sources ofthe Self, p. 368 - 489; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 361, 367 - 8, 380 - 97. 59 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 393.
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60
61

Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 393. Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxii. 62 Isaiah Berlin, Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxx, and p. xxix, respectively. 63 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 4; Berlin makes this point particularly in relation to political neutrality in Isaiah Berlin, Stuart Hampshire, Iris Murdoch and Anthony Quinton, "Philosophy and Beliefs," The Twentieth Century, Volume 157 (January - June 1955), p. 519. 64 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 353. 65 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 55. 66 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 47 - 8, 58. 67 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 49 - 50. 68 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 165. 69 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 49. 70 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 77. 71 Based on C.J. Galipeau, p. 26 - 28, and Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in The Proper Study ofMankind. 72 See, for example, Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 35; and Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 98; Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. l25n and l26n. 73 Most famously in "Two Concepts of Liberty," but elsewhere as well- including also in a range of articles "Socialism and Socialist Theories," "Marxism and the International," as well as in his book on Marx, and in comments relating Hegel across the articles, and particularly in "Historical Inevitability" - and especially in his interview with Jahanbegloo. See note. 20. 74 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 126n. 75 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 74n. 76 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism (London: Ark Paperbacks, 1989), p. 3. 77 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 35. 78 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 131. 79 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 109. 80 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 392. 81 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 93 - 104. 82 That is, in Popper's hostility to radical or revolutionary social transformation (in favor of piecemeal social change) - Karl Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1966), p. 1 - 2. 83 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal" The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 12 - 3. 84 Isaiah Belrin, "The Pursuit of the Idea," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 13. 85 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, 86 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Pursuit ofMankind, p. 130, 129 - 36.
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87 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. x - xi; this is a summary of Berlin's position in "Historical Inevitability," The Pursuit ofthe Ideal, p. 119 - 190; 88 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 109, and Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 86. 89 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 17. 90 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 5. 9[ Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 5. 92 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Imiah Berlin, p. 70 - 1, and especially p. 76; Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 90; Ramin Jahanbegloo, Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 70 - 1. 93 See Isaiah Berlin, Karl Marx: His Life and Environment, p. 158, and p. 282 - 4; Isaiah Berlin, The Magus ofthe North: J G. Hamann and the Origins ofModern Irrationalism, p. 112, 114 - 5, 122 - 3, 127 - 8: also see his study of "Sorel" and even to sorne extent his articles on Vico and Herder. 94 Karl Popper, The Poverty ofHistoricism, p. 130. 95 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 358. 96 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," p. 559. 97 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," p. 559. 98 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 169. 99 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 82; see also Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 119. [00 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 82; also see, Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?", The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 83. [01 Isaiah Berlin, Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxii. 102 Kas Mazurek, p. 399. 103 The category of moral agency is, to take sorne obvious cases, both conceived quite differently and accorded different weight in a modem liberal-democratic culture, in a purely predeterminist or fatalist culture, or in a totalitarian society directed to sorne allencompassing public goal. Human reason and human imagination receive very different constructions in Enlightenment and unbridled Romantic cultures. 104 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 177. [05 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390. 106 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 108. [07 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 100, and repeated on p. 101. [08 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 101. 109 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 8 - 9. [10 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390, Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," p. 557. 111 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. Iii. 112 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 113 - 4; Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," p. 557.

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Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. liii. 114 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 37; and Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 203 - 5; 115 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 113 - 4. 116 Isaiah Berlin, The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," p. 204. 117 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to R.H. Mckinney," p. 559. 118 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 114. 119 For the burden of universality, see, for example, Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 286. 120 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 31 - 2, 109 - 110, 113 6. 121 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 114. 122 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 108 - 9. 123 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 114. 124 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 200 - 1. 125 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 69 - 70, 74; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 187. 126 From Isaiah Berlin in "Between Philosophy and the History of Ideas: A Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 101; mimeo, p. 38, cited in John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 159. 127 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 204 - 5. 128 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 200. 129 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 114. 130 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 203. 131 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 32 - 4,109, etc. 132 Isaiah Berlin, "Three Strands of My Life," p. 6. 133 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Robert Kocis," p. 392. 134 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in the Proper Study ofMankind, p. 23. 135 Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," in the Proper Study ofMankind, p. 23. 136 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 431. 137 Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality, p. 18. 138 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," p. 83. 139 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 245. 140 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," P. 105. 141 Mark Lilla, "Wolves and Lambs," in The Legacy ofBerlin, p. 38 - 9. 142 Isaiah Berlin, "The Sense of Reality," in The Sense ofReality, p. 18. 143 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 105. 144 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 69.
113

146

145 146

C.J. Galipeau, p. 113. Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Froper Study ofMankind, p.

59.
147 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 193. ("Political philosophy," he insists " ... is but ethics applied to society." 147 (Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 1.) 148 Ronald Dworkin, "Foundations of Liberal Equality," p. 205 - 11. 149 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 192. 150 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Froper Study of Manking, p. 76. 151 C. J. Galipeau, p. 35. 152 Isaiah BeIrin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 84. 153 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 60 - 1; also see Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose of Philosophy," in Concepts and Categories, p.1 3. 154 Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," Concepts and Categories, p. 3. Further examples include: One of the surest hallmarks of a philosophical question ... is that we are puzzled from the very outset, that there is no automatic technique, no universally recognized expertise, for dealing with such questions. We discover that we do not feel sure how to set about clearing our minds, finding out the truth, accepting or rejecting earlier answers to these questions. Neither induction (in its widest sense of scientific reasoning), nor direct observation (appropriate to empirical enquiries, nor deduction (demanded by formaI problems) seem to be ofhelp. Once we feel quite clear about how we should proceed, the questions no longer seem philosophical. (Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 62.) If you don't quite know how to answer - there is no accepted technique for this then you are engaged in doing philosophy. (Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 139.) Aiso see, Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," Concepts and Categories, p. 3. This makes a very wide spectrum of questions philosophical. All kinds of personal question which we cannot put to rest, concerning which we are unable to satisfy ourselves with an answer, take on philosophical connotations. This is a much wider understanding of philosophy than is standardly employed 155 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 62. 156 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," The Sense ofReality, p. 71. 157 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," The Sense ofReality, p. 61; Berlin writes, "philosophy cornes from collisions of ideas which create problems." (Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 27). 158 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 86. 159 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," The Sense ofReality, p. 69. 160 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Froper Study ofMankind, p. 71.

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161

Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 27. Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p.

8I.
162 163

87. Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 84 - 5. 165 Thomas Kuhn, The Structure ofScientific Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), p. 1 - 9, and in more detail, p. 23 - 34 and p. 91 - 109. 166 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 30. 167 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 46. 168 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 30. 169 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 85, also see p. 87. 170 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 64 - 5. 171 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 65. 172 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 74. 173 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMan kind, p. 192; also see, Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense of Reality, p. 67. 174 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense ofReality, p. 65. 175 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense ofReality, p. 66 - 67. 176 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense ofReality, p. 67,70. 177 Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense ofReality, p. 65 - 6. 178 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15.
164

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The history of political thought has, to a large degree, consisted in a dual between these two great rival conceptions of society. On one side stand the advocates of pluralism and variety and an open market for ideas, an order of things which clashes and the constant need for conciliation, adjustment, balance, an order that is always in a condition of imperfect equilibrium, which is required to be maintained by conscious effort. On the other side are to be found those who believe that this precarious condition is a form of chronic social and personal disease, since health consists in unity, peace, the elimination of the very possibility of disagreement, the recognition of only one end or set of nonconfiicting ends as being alone rational, with the corollary that rational disagreement can affect only means - the upholders of the tradition ofPlato and the Stoics, the philosophia perennis of the Middle Ages, Spinoza and Helvetius, Rousseau and Fichte, and classical political theory.\ - Isaiah Berlin, "Marxism in the Eighteenth Century" This idea ofpluralism involves "the beliefnot only in the multiplicity, but in the incommensurabilty, ofthe values of different societies, and, in addition, in the incompatibility of equally valid ideals. ,,2 - Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment"

Chapter 4: Strong Pluralism and Liberty 4.i Disputed Intentions

AlI of Berlin's major interpreters agree at least that pluralism is a very important element in Berlin's thought. For many it is the cornerstone, or, in Gray's words, the "idee
maitresse," ofhis work. 3 It is also a very controversial element. On the liberal readings,

pluralism is a significant and quite innovative aspect of Berlin's thought, but remains subordinate to a prior commitment to liberalism, and more specificalIy, to negative liberty. On the strong pluralist readings it emerges as the most important and compelling element in his work, although Berlin is often characterized even on these readings as a kind of reluctant or unintentional strong pluralist, unwilling to acknowledge its real predominance in his thought. John Gray, for example, writes that in interpreting "the bottom line" in Berlin's thought as "not a liberal agon but agonistic pluralism," that he "takes a step for which there is no clear authority in Berlin's writing, and which he might be reluctant to follow.,,4 While this view is presented as comporting best with the thrust of Berlin's thought, it "is not Berlin's." John Kekes presents his strong pluralism as inspired by Berlin, but when push cornes to shove he stilliists Berlin as a liberal (a position which he sees as incompatible with pluralism). 5

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Certainly, there are a few pluralist readers who have suggested that Berlin deliberately adopted a strong pluralist position. Eric Mack, for example, sees his work evolving progressively towards a strong pluralist position which "consign[s] liberty to the moral scales, to be weighed against the multitude of other incommensurable values.,,6 Mack's brief, critical article, however, provides only intimations of a reading of Berlin along these lines, and that only in relation to Berlin's late work. George Crowder attributes a strong pluralist position to Berlin as weIl, but only cursorily, as a preface to an argument against any compelling connection between liberalism and pluralism. Crowder, moreover, like many critics of the strong pluralist position winds up maintaining that Berlin's pluralism requires treating aIl values equally - "If values are plural, then they must be equally valuable, hence deserving of equal respect.,,7 In a direct response to Crowder, Berlin forcefully rejects this attribution as an unwarranted inference, ungrounded in his texts. What, then is the character of Berlin's pluralism? What will be advanced here is a variation on the strong pluralist reading which portrays Berlin as consistently advocating a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate moral and political values recognizable in the contemporary West. What Berlin argues is essential in politicallife is to maintain and be guided by a loose, open-ended equilibrium of these equally ultimate values, which includes, but gives no special precedence to, negative liberty. This interpretation cuts obviously against liberal readings, such as those of Ignatieff or Galipeau, who see Berlin, respectively, as calling for a "regime of negative liberty," or a "great amount of negative liberty" supplemented with a universal naturallaw protecting a core minimum of negative liberty. It also cuts against Gray's strong pluralist reading which portrays Berlin investing a supreme constitutive value in self-creation. In-so-far as Berlin insistently defends a range of equally "ultimate" values, he seems to preclude a supreme overriding value or summum

bonum. Moreover, this reading cuts against strong pluralist readings reluctant to see
Berlin as a deliberate and consistent pluralist. Tt even disagrees with Mack that there is an important transition in Berlin's thought from liberal commitments to pluralist ones, and with Crowder that Berlin's pluralism requires treating aIl values equally - for not aIl values are objective or ultimate.

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The two main claims of this section can be integrated as 'Berlin deliberately defended a strong pluralism which provided no special status to negative liberty (or selfcreation), but treated it as one among a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate values.' The second section ofthis chapter develops this contention in terms ofBerlin's treatment of pluralism, while the third section focuses on his treatment of liberty. 1 will suggest in the conclusion that understanding Berlin not as developing a direct defense of liberalism through negative liberty, but as developing a variant of strong pluralism focusing on a limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate values also helps to clear up the criticism, especially prominent in liberal interpretations, that Berlin's political thought was underdeveloped. None ofthis is to say that liberty in general or negative liberty more specifically are not extremely plausible and resonant values in Western society with long and distinguished pedigrees, and indeed, are not held as ultimate by more individuals and societies than any other values. It seems likely that they are. Berlin even suggests that were liberty to cease to be valued, it would, in his estimate, mark the decline of a civilization - by which he seems to mean the closing of the modern age. He does, however, specifically acknowledge this possibility.8

It is equally not my intention to deny that Berlin offered a powerful and

impassioned defense of liberty, particularly individualliberty. He did. My intention is rather to argue that such defenses are necessary because in a pluralist world the prior status of even such ultimate values cannot be assumed. Thus, when he poses ultimate questions 'Should democracy in a given situation be promoted at the expense of individual freedom? Or equality at the expense of artistic achievement; or mercy at the expense ofjustice; or spontaneity at the expense of efficiency; or happiness, loyalty, innocence at the expense of knowledge and truth?,9 - he cannot but conclude "The simple point 1 am trying to make is that where ultimate values are irreconcilable, clear-cut solutions cannot, in principle, be found."IO In the ncxt paragraph he affirms "that the issue depends on one's view ofhuman nature, or ofhuman goals (on which men differ) ...." This does not mean that we cannot challenge and confront other mens' views ofhuman nature, and particularly the basic models of politicallife they support, or the actions or regimes they justify, when they seem on our
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best understanding superficial, self-serving, implausible, fallacious or grounded in empirically false beliefs. Berlin, for example, when confronted quite personally with the harsh Soviet oppression ofhis native Russia, responded in "Two Concepts of Liberty" with, as he later conceded, a deliberate challenge to Soviet doctrine, and its underlying Marxist theory as weIl as to a set of similar views ofhuman goals and nature. 11 Berlin defended liberty in many, although by no means aIl, particular cases, precisely because it needed continuaI defense. Where he did so defend it, he appealed not to any overriding principle, but to the demonstrable deficiencies, contradictions, implausibilities, errors and dangers of the countervailing doctrines. It is unfortunate, at least in a sense, that the force of Berlin's particular arguments should have obscured the underlying depth of his pluralism. Berlin himself attempts to clarify this confusion in the Introduction to Four Essays on Liberty: This, indeed, was the point of the penultimate paragraph of p. 171, which was widely taken as an unqualified defence of negative against positive liberty. This was not my intention. This much criticized passage was meant as a defence, indeed, but of pluralism, based on the perception of incompatibility between the daims ofequally ultimate ends, against any ruthless monism which solves such problems by eliminating aIl but one of the rival claimants. 1 have therefore revised the text to make it clear that 1 am not ofJering a blanket endorsement of the negative concept as opposed to its positive twin brother, since this would itself constitute precisely the kind ofintolerant monism against which the entire "d" d argument IS lrecte. 12 ['la] What 1 am trying to draw attention to here is that where Berlin passionately defends negative liberty - generally where it is egregiously violated and denied the status of an ultimate value in favor sorne monistic alternative - he does so in terms of an underlying pluralist model, a model animated by the recognition of the incompatible claims of equally ultimate ends. He defends negative liberty as one among a group of equally ultimate ends which he believes are clearly recognizable today. What he objects to are forms of monism which seek to deny it what he sees as its recognizable status as one among the limited but open-ended range of equally ultimate values. 4.ii Berlin's Strong Pluralism
It may help to understand Berlin's pluralism first to understand what it is not -

that is, monism. Berlin identifies two main sorts of monism, which 1 think can be characterized as traditional monism (which Berlin associates with the major Classical and
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Enlightenment thinkers), and a peculiar forrn of modem monism which he sees emerging in diverse forms in the twentieth century. In the most general terms monism is defined as the simple precept that "One is good, Many - diversity - is bad, since the truth is one and only error is multiple .... ,,13 What Berlin refers to as the 'monist presupposition' is the assumption that since the truth is one, theories which attain to unity are better than those allow for internai diversity and conflict. Once unity is achieved, dissent may be dismissed as error, weakness, stupidity and confusion. Berlin argues that a great deal of moral and political thought right down to the present day has been sustained by monist presuppositions, and it is a continuaI preoccupation of his writing to expose and challenge such assumptlOns.

14

Berlin defines traditional monism in terms of the following claims: (a) that to aIl genuine questions there is one true answer and one only, aIl others being deviations from the truth and therefore false, and that this applies to questions of conduct and feeling, that is, to practice, as weIl as to questions of theory or observation - to questions of values no less than those of fact; (b) that the true answers to such questions are in principle knowable; (c) that these true answers cannot clash with one another, for one true proposition cannot be incompatible with another; that together these answers must form a harmonious whole: according to sorne they form a logical system each ingredient of which 10gicaIly entails and is entailed by aIl the other elements; according to others the relationship is that of parts to a whole, or at the very least, of complete 15 compatibility of each element with aIl the others. In essence, there is one truth or set oftruths which can in principle be known and organized into a coherent system and which can authoritatively organize moral and political life. Berlin sees this model as a pervasive assumption of the main classical traditions, Enlightenment thought, and indeed right up into the dominant forms of contemporary philosophy. Evidently then, monism can take many forrns. The paradigm case appears to be what Berlin caIls ''philosophia perennis" which Berlin defines as "the old perennial beliefin the possibility ofrealizing ultimate harmony.,,16 In Berlin's view, classical manists like Plata and Aristatle, for example, appealed ta a supreme good or

summum bonum which defined the human telos or ultimate purpose in terms of which
other goods were to be understood and integrated into a harmonious system. 17 Enlightenment rationalist monists, such as the philisophes, similarly held that the strict exercise of human reason reveals "the true, the only true, ends that aIl wise men

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sought at aIl times - in art, in thought, in morals and manners," and their rational and harmonious relationships - forming what Condorcet called an "indissoluble chain.,,18 These true ends were "timeless and universal and known to aIl reasonable men.,,19 ria] Enlightenment empiricists, by contrast, generally focused on accounts of human nature as the focal point of an integrated and enduring human truth. Hume, for example, maintained that "mankind is much the same in aIl times and places,,,2o and Locke dec1ared that "Vertues and vices ... for the most part are much the same everywhere.,,21 Once exposed, human nature can then provide an authoritative and coherent basis for organizing human moral and politicallife. More recent variants of traditional monism inc1ude utilitarianism and positivism which seek in different ways to reformulate moral and political thought along the lines of the natural sciences. According to utilitarians, values can be, at least in principle, quantified in terms of sorne perceptible measure - for example, Bentham's hedonistic ca1culus of pleasure - and thereby rationalized and ranked in terms of a standard measure. Positivists, in Berlin' s view, pursued a course of methodological monism, applying a single criterion of truth, characteristically verification, across the natural sciences and human disciplines. 22 Statements which could be framed in this fashion were alone to be treated as meaningful. The positivist aspiration was then to integrate meaningful statements into a coherent scientific theory which would form the basis of an authoritative reorganization of the humanities.

In Berlin's view, each form oftraditional monism sought an authoritative,

coherent and knowable framework for human moral and politicallife grounded in appeal to sorne unitary underlying truth. This may be, as in Plato, an appeal to the Forms, or for Descartes reason, or for Locke divine will (particularly in the formation of human nature), or as in the case of utilitarians and positivists largely to the natural sciences. In opposition to the idea that there is a single coherent and knowable moral and political truth, or compossible set thereof, Berlin argues that the best interpretation of our moral life is that there are multiple and sometimes incompatible truths and ultimate values, both across and within cultures and historical periods, most notably our own. This interpretation militates against both the viability and desirability of unified general frameworks of moral and politicallife. It rather leads Berlin to the defense of an uneasy

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and open-ended equilibrium of sometimes rivalrous equally ultimate moral and political values. In essence, Berlin argues that 'many truths' do better justice to our moral and politicallives than one truth. In summary then, traditional monism maintains (1) the truth is one, either in the sense of embodying a single overriding human purpose, a set of compossible or potentially integrated human values or ends, or a common medium in terms of which human values or ends can be weighed and ranked. (2) There is, at least in principle, a possibility of a perfect human society organized in light of this truth. (3) The uncovering of this truth should be the 0 bj ect of philosophical thought. (4) Philosophical, and particularly moral and political theories, should be judged in terms of their success in achieving truth, which implies at least an internaI unity and integrity.23 Berlin also identified a modem version of monism which he found particularly troubling, but which has been somewhat neglected in treatments of his thought. With the "collapse of public philosophy" general metaphysical conceptions, including those characterized by the traditional assumptions outlined above, became widely implausible. In other words, the strategy of deriving a monist framework from sorne authoritative source, be it God, human nature or natural science,24 became far more problematic than it had appeared in the past. The defense of an authoritative moral or political value or coherent set thereof, therefore, had resort in the twentieth century to a new strategy characterized by the dismissal and even removal of alternatives, often posed in the form of troubling questions. The unity of truth is here assured not by its metaphysical, teleological or theological deduction but by the practical elimination, exclusion or suppression of challenges. Berlin's paradigm cases here are offascist and Soviet practice?S The fascist insistence, for example, that the nation was in a permanent state of emergency, fighting for its life against hostile and implacable enemies both without and within provided the effective basis for the permanent privileging of the moral and political value of national survival, of strict obedience to the state and the suppression of competing values and concerns as counter-productive ofthat effort. 26 A favored Soviet strategy for the elimination of questions, also perceptible in fascist discourse, was to claim that people were undergoing or would undergo a revolutionary transformation whereby the concerns which motivated troubling questions would be transfigured or

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eliminated. Indeed, the questions themselves were viewed as reflective of archaic and socially counter-productive ideologies. 27 The suppression of challenging views and concerns was also accomplished by reformulating philosophical questions as technical ones which experts alone were qualified to answer, sometimes by appeal to basic points of rational consensus which, for the sake of social stability or similar overriding goals, must be given sharp priority. The practical purpose in each case was to discourage troubling questions, and thus to encourage the graduaI adjustment and socialization of citizens to accept public truths:
It consists in something which nineteenth century thinker with respect for the sciences would have regarded with genuine horror - the training of the individual incapable of being troubled by questions which, when raised and 28 discussed, endanger the stability of the system.

As with traditional monism, then, the core idea is of a single authoritative value or set of compossible moral and political values which should guide people's thoughts and actions. The essential difference is that the framework of exclusively privileged beliefs and interpretations are protected primarily by practical exigencies rather than defended through general metaphysical, theological, teleological or scientific deductions. Berlin sees modern monism as taking a milder but essentially analogous form in the nations of the modern West: In Western Europe this tendency has taken the milder form of a shift of emphasis away from disagreements about political principles ... towards disagreements, ultimately technical, about methods - about the best way of achieving that degree of minimum economic or social stability without which arguments concerned with fundamental principles and the ends oflife are felt to be 'abstract', 'academic', and unrelated to the urgent needs of the hour?9 Modern monism in the West then primarily takes the form of a de-emphasis on disputes about fundamental political values and principles coupled with an increasing emphasis on practical issues of efficiency and stability, and other 'urgent needs of the hour.' It need not then embrace either the first claim oftraditional monism (that the truth is necessarily one) or the second (the possibility of a perfect human society). Nonetheless, on more pragmatic grounds it does insist that the moral and political thought and philosophical questions are useful in the degree to which they serve practical social purposes, such as unity and economic and social stability. Moreover, it insists that the value and

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importance of philosophical challenges and speculation reside in their contributions to the 'urgent needs of the hour.' Where they do not so contribute, they lack value and may even be counter-productive. Practical considerations, such as unity and stability, trump 'abstract' philosophical disputes. Berlin allows that this type of modem monism is compatible both with "genuine material gains, and no less genuine growth of social equality.,,3o Nonetheless, Berlin emerges as a passionate defender of "disbelief," "moral independence," "originality of judgment,,,31 of the contention offundamental political and philosophical ideas. He advances the value in public affairs of"a logically untidy, flexible, and even ambiguous compromise," which while not optimally efficient or stable, recognizes the profound "variety of persons and ofthe relationships between them,,,32 and permits, even encourages, basic "heterodoxy." In relation to modem monism, Berlin's normative defense ofpluralism, as opposed to the descriptive concept, is particularly clear. What disturbs him is precisely the erosion or elimination of pluralism in favor of monism - a tendency he finds characteristic of the twentieth century across the spectrum of political ideologies, from communist to liberal to reactionary. The threat is of an effective transformation to a descriptive condition of monism which Berlin finds normatively undesirable. The essential question then is what is the view of pluralism that Berlin develops in contrast to these forms of monism. There are many understandings of pluralism in circulation today, and it is essential, if confusion and error are to be held to a minimum, to get a firm grip on how Berlin uses the term. He offers a range of definitions, sorne quite involved, but 1 think perhaps the best, and certainly among the most direct, is the following, which can provide a guideline to further investigation: pluralism is "the conception that there are many different ends that men may seek and still be fully rational, fully men, capable ofunderstanding each other and sympathizing with and deriving light from one another. ,,33 The reference here to sympathizing and deriving light point back to the importance Berlin lays on empathy, and more specifically on direct engagement over particular cases, in sustaining political thought and ultimately selfunderstanding. It also reflects again the evaluative component of Berlin's view of pluralism. The essential intuition here seems to be that there may be a range of these

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ends which people may hold with similar validity, according to their own plausible models of moral and politicallife and that rationality may not always provide a means of deciding between them. What needs to be investigated more closely is the sense of the 'many different ends men may seek.' Berlin also frequently writes in this sense of a plurality of values, or ultimate values, or even 'equally ultimate values' or 'ends' and their 'incommensurability' and 'incompatibility.,34 The essential question is what is the source ofthis pluralist idea, and what exactly does it entail. Berlin argues that pluralism pervades Western moral and political thought. He sees pluralism as expressing the diversity of ultimate human values, sometimes incommensurable, sometimes incompatible, penetrating through three distinct levels of our moral and politicallives - inter-cultural, intra-cultural and conceptual. Berlin writes that his real discovery of pluralism came with Vico, and even more dramatically with Machiavelli. This seems a logical place to begin an examination of his idea of pluralism. One thing which immediate1y stands out in such an examination is the affirmation of the central historicist notion of cultures, epochs and civilizations as unique expressive wholes in Berlin's development ofpluralism: For Vico there is a plurality of civilizations ... each with its own unique pattern. Machiavelli conveyed the idea of two incompatible outlooks; and here were societies the cultures of which were shaped by values, not means to ends but ultimate ends, ends in themselves, which differed, not in all respects - for they were all human - but in sorne profound, irreconcilable ways, not combinable in any final synthesis. 35 Berlin argues that Machiavelli used Meinecke's dagger to inflict on Western philosophy "the wound that never heals" - and thus demonstrated that the search for the "sole, true, objective universal human ideal" was "conceptually incoherent."36 He did so by recognizing that Ends, equally ultimate, may contradict each other, so that entire systems of value may come into collision without possibility of rational arbitration, and that this
happens not merely in exceptional circumstances, as a result of abnormality or

accident or error. .. but (this is surely new) as part of the normal human situation. 37

The particular collision that Machiavelli revealed was one between great, civilizational cultures, specifical1y of Christian and Classical Republican ethics or worldviews:

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If Machiavelli is right, if it is in principle (or in fact: the frontier seems dim) impossible to be morally good and do one's duty as this was conceived by common European and especially Christian ethics, and at the same time build Sparta or Periclean Athens or the Rome of the Republic or even of the Antonines, then a conclusion of the first consequence follows: that the belief in the correct, objectively valid solution to the question ofhow men should live can in principle be discovered is itselfin principle not true .... this rock on which Western beliefs and lives had been founded, Machiavelli seems, in effect, to have split open. J8 No one seemed anxious to grapple with [Machiavelli's] insight into the possibility that the Christian and the pagan answers to moral or political questions might both be correct given the premises from which they start; that these premises were not demonstrably false, only incompatible; and that no single overarching standard or criterion was available to decide between, or reconcile, these wholly opposed mora1 39 Itles. Here we have, l think, the kernel of Berlin's notion of pluralism: quite reasonable and moral persons can disagree fundamentally on moral and political problems so that attempts at further justification lead in opposite, or at least quite different, directions and no rational resolution is possible, or is compelling to both parties. This insight is set-up in direct contrast with any notion oftraditional monism - a single valid standard ofhow men should live cannot be discovered; no single overarching standard is available. The values, ideals, and virtues ofpagan-Republican life and pious-Christian life seem, at least at first glance, almost wholly at odds, but appeal to equally plausible and valid premises.
It is instructive to note that neither moral world seems necessarily to hold any special

place for negative liberty. Now Berlin will press this sort of argumentation far beyond the general cultural or civilizational pluralism that he derives from Machiavelli, Vico and later Herder. Before tracing his argument further, however, it will be helpful to pause for a moment and gather a more acute understanding of the structure and form of his argument for pluralism, and what precisely is entailed. The essential insight seems to be that one could not be both a good early roman citizen and a good Christian, although it is not clear that either side is necessarily better than the other. The goods involved clash, and at the same time they seem impossible to weigh directly against one another. There seem then to be two critical features of the pluralistic condition as Berlin describes it, the possibility of incompatibility and incomparability: he writes, pluralism is "the belief not merely in the multiplicity, but in

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the incommensurability, of the values of different cultures and societies, and, in addition, in the incompatibility of equally valid ideals ...."40 What, however, does Berlin mean with this rather obscure expression 'incommensurability'? The exact entailments of the term are themselves rather widely contested in the contemporary literature, but Berlin seems to use it in a comparatively basic, standard sense to mean in more colloquial language, 'it is like comparing apples and oranges'; the objects of comparison are different sorts of things which cannot, without distortion, be reduced to a common denominator or unit ofmeasurement. 41 Gray gives a good summary ofthis idea: By incommensurability, then, is meant incomparability - the incomparability of valuable cultural objects, activities, reasons for action or forms of life. In ethics an implication of incommensurability is the reality of an ultimate diversity of incomparable forms ofhuman excellence or flourishing .....42 Incommensurability, then, should not be confused with rough equality or indeterminacy the point is not that the measurements are approximately the same, or that they are difficult to specify with precision, but that no comparable measurement is possible for the two positions as rational claims. This latter description relies upon the notion of rational incomparability - where direct comparison through a common measure is excluded, we must be dealing with incommensurables. Another way of describing the phenomenon is this: "Two valuable options are incommensurable if (1) neither is better than the other, and (2) there is (or could be) another option which is better than one but is not better than the other."43 The key notion here is the 'intransitivity' of values which is taken as an indication of the absence of direct bases for comparison. Nowa difficulty will arise at this point, because Berlin does talk about these ultimate values being, at least in a sense, equal, or equally ultimate. This is a problem which Gray does not explore, but 1 do not think that it creates a grave difficulty with his description of incommensurability itself. The sense of equality or equal ultimacy seems to refer to the idea that values exhibit the same kind of claim to validity, they flow, like Christianity and classical republicanism, directly from similarly plausible basic models of moral and politicallife. For Berlin, this equal ultimacy indicates that values are recognizably held as ends-in-themselves, or ultimate ends. In other words, they are recognizable as bound up with our basic beliefs about what it is to be human or decent so that, like those who refused to cooperate with the Nazis, those who hold them could not
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break these principles beyond a certain threshold withoutfeeling that they hadforfeited human respect; they could not betray them and face themselves and others. A helpful
way of characterizing this type of commitment, which Berlin seems to suggest in a number of important passages, is that these values or ideals are equally ultimate in the sense of being similarly integral to, or constitutive of, the identity of the individual or group, society or civilization in which they are held: for example, "fundamental moral categories and concepts... are as much part of their [e.g., people' s] being and conscious

thought and sense oftheir own identity, as their basic physical structure.,,44 This type of
characterization helps to show why the neglect or suppression of ultimate values beyond a certain point can do irreparable harm - it represses not merely a value that people hold contingently, but one which is integrally bound up with who they are. 45 This understanding of values, as bound up with specifie agencies rather than as independent objects, may create difficulty for Gray's account of ethical realism and objective pluralism,46 but it does not impinge on incommensurability as rational incomparability. Pluralism then indicates a spectrum of values which are, at least sometimes, both rationally incomparable and incompatible, although similarly and understandably elevated on a scale of values or basic to identity. Such a plural condition obviously marks a kind of break or limit to the power ofreason. Where such values collide incompatibly and incommensurably, we are confronted with radical choices between systems of value which must be made without the final appeal to reason. There have been, and perhaps still are, many civilizations with their own internaI value structures: Communities may resemble each other in many respects, but the Greeks differ from Lutheran Germans, the Chinese differ from both; what they strive after and what they fear and worship are scarcely ever similar. 47 If a choice between such communities has to be made, reason seems helpless to convincingly reveal which is ultimately the best or ideal, and therefore to judge authoritatively between their claims. For Berlin, there is an important sense in which "cultures are incommensurable.,,48 This does not mean, however, that they differ in all respects or that communication and understanding are not possible or that we may not even make judgments, say to condemn evil acts, which in many cases which will carry force across cultural boundaries, but it does recognize that there will be sorne values,

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embedded in different forms of life, in different basic models of human nature and human aims, which will sometimes be beyond the capacity of reason to weigh against one another. This then is the basic kemel of Berlin' s idea of pluralism - the diversity of incommensurable, sometimes incompatible constitutive values, similarly integral within forms of life. These represent the many different ends that men may rationally seek, and still be men 'capable of understanding, sympathizing and deriving light from each other. ' Berlin's development of pluralism does not, however, stop with the fundamental diversity of civilizations, or cultures on a large scale but seeps down to a deeper second level. Even within civilizations or cultures, at the level of the society or group or individual, he argues, the basic models of human life, and the values, ideals and basic categories they support, may be pluralistic and may conflict: "What is clear is that values can clash - that is why civilizations are incompatible. They can be incompatible between
cultures, or groups in the same culture, or between you and me.,,49 [ia] These diverse

basic models may support quite different values, even within a given form of life. So within cultures, and civilizations, many societies, groups and individuals will hold rival, incomparable and sometimes incompatible ultimate values. This situation suggests how pluralism can entail a certain kind of radical or even tragic conflict arising between societies or groups or individuals who hold incompatible and incommensurable (ultimate) values, which, in a given situation come into inescapable collision. Sorne among the Great Goods cannot live together. That is a conceptual truth. We are doomed to choose, and every choice may involve irreparable loss .... 50 In-so-far as these collisions occur between different societies, groups and individuals, these could be described as reflecting external pluralism. This situation, however, already implicitly suggests an even more troubling insight. If a society, say, can be composed of two large groups which hold different, incomparable and sometimes incompatible ultimate values, then it may be said of the society itselfthat it encompasses two fundamentally pluralistic values, and may, in sorne cases of collision between these values, find itself deeply conflicted. The same will hold for groups in relation to particular individuals, and finally within individuals themselves: Values may easily clash within the breast of a single individual; and it does not follow that, if they do, sorne must be true and others false. Justice, rigorous justice, is for sorne people an absolute value, but it is not compatible with what
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may be no less ultimate values for them - mercy, compassion - as arises in concrete cases. 5 1 Individuals, groups, societies, cultures may then, in view of a capacity to embrace multiple incomparable and sometimes even incompatible ultimate values also experience internaI radical and even tragic conflicts. In-so-far as incompatible and incommensurable value conflicts occur within societies, groups or individuals, such conflicts reflect

internai pluralism. Pluralism then arises within cultures in the same way that it arises
between them, and potentially with similar depth and irreconcilability. Now this conclusion willlikely seem troubling, but not terribly surprising. Most readers willlikely agree that people, groups, societies do seem to hold to certain values that define, in a sense, who they are, and that arguments, disputes, even wars have been fought over conflicting principles, nationalism and liberty, for example, or perhaps between monarchy or traditional authority and liberty or equality, or sorne may want to say negative liberty and forms of positive liberty. Berlin's point is that these disputes have often arisen not, as has often been believed, due to confusion, ignorance or misunderstanding, or lack of vision, or lies or self-interest (although in cases these can aH be contributors too) but because the values, as we actually know and employ them, do sometimes conflict incommensurably and incompatibly. Indeed, Berlin then pushes his argument a further level down, and argues that pluralism mns down into the very bones of discourse, into the interior of the very concepts that discourse and theories deploy, such as liberty and equality. The essence of his argument is that these values encompass within themselves a number of distinct ideas, or sub-concepts or values, and that in many cases these ideas stand in a pluralistic relation to one another: these sub-concepts or values are sometimes incommensurable and incompatible. Moreover, many ofthese plural sub-values are rationally defensible, so that a reasonable person might accept one or another of them, or both. The consequence is that people can quite reasonably and plausibly disagree not only about which values are relevant but also about what these values mean or entail, and these disagreements will manifest themselves, for example, in rival formulations of values and their related concepts. Indeed, Berlin digs deeper and argues that even the sub-concepts encompassed

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in the general concepts often will be shot through with internaI pluralism. He argues that these different conceptual meanings generally spring from differences of basic models: it seems clear that disagreements about the analysis of value concepts, as often as not, spring from profounder differences, since the notions of, say, rights or justice or liberty, will be radically dissimilar for theists and atheists, mechanistic determinists and Christians, Hege1ians and empiricists, romantic irrationalists and Marxists, and so forth. It seems no less clear that these differences are not, at least prima facie, either logical or empirical, and have usually and rightly have been classified as irreduceably philosophical. 52
It is this idea of conceptual pluralism which most seriously threatens the persuasiveness

of a priori monistic conceptions -

it offers a conceptual, explanatory foundation for

what has already been encountered as an interpretive empirical proposition. If even our central moral and political concepts and values give way to pluralism, then it must be difficult indeed to produce a compelling monist theory. Berlin argues, for example, that the concept of equality is deeply internally pluralistic. In characteristic style, Berlin sets out an "irreducable minimum" or kernel of the ideal of equality," - "every man to count for one and no one to count for more than one. ,,53 Berlin allows that this formulation is "vague, ambiguous, and has changed its connotation from one thinker and society to another." It contains, however, at least two general sub-concepts which have been variously deve1oped, either towards "similar treatment,,54 or similar condition - "the wish that everything and everybody should be as similar as possible to everything else. ,,55 These two ideas or sub-concepts will, in sorne concrete situations, collide. When different meanings conflict, we judge as we can, comparing the overall holistic strengths of the competing perspectives. In the following excerpt, Berlin describes the clash between extensions of equality, and introduces the idea that particular points of conflict often cut across other conceptual dualities: we find in analyzing equality ... a typical clash between two systems incompatible in practice, each of which can claim to promote equality; one in the matter of the machinery of selfgovemment, the other in the matter of distribution of rewards. Similarly there is a conflict between those for whom equality means non-discrimination in fields of human activity deemed important (however these are identified) on the basis of unalterable characteristics... and those who reject this as an inadequate criterion and desire equality of treatment to remain unaffected even by such 'alterable' attributes as religious or political views, personal habits and the like. We seem to

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choose as we choose because one solution seems to us to embody a blend of satisfactions of c1aims and desires (or to contain or omit other factors) which we 56 prefer as a total pattern to the blend provided by the other solution. These two sub-concepts of equality carry sorne affinity with the more familiar contemporary distinction between equality of opportunity and equality of outcome, respectively. What is more, each sub-concept of equality itself contains distinct ideas or sub-ideas, which may themselves fall into conflict. It may be that we cannot have perfect equality of condition because sorne types of equality effectively prec1ude others - an equality of quantities may, given the way the world is, be incompatible with an equality of quality, so that we have to choose which sort of equality of condition we mean. Equality is also externally part of a pluralistic range of values, inc1uding "other ideals with which it cannot be wholly reconciled.,,57 Berlin argues, as we will see in the next section, that these points hold true of liberty as well. Berlin argues then that pluralism may be evidenced between cultures or historical epochs, within cultures or historical epochs, either at a social, group or individuallevel, and indeed within concepts or values themselves. Where such pluralism exists, conflicts may in sorne cases arise wherein competing values, or sub-values, are incompatible and incommensurable. His point is not that these values will always be incommensurable or incompatible in all particular cases of conflict either between or within societies. Berlin cautions that "we must not dramatize the incompatibility of values - there is a great deal broad agreement among people in different societies over long stretches of time about what is right and wrong, good and evil.,,58 In a joint publication, he and Bernard Williams offer the example ofjustice and loyalty.59 In sorne particular cases of conflict, there will be very broad agreement that justice should trump loyalty, and sometimes vice versa. If, for example, one were told in strict confidence by one's best friend that she intended in all seriousness to go on a murderous rampage the next morning, we would likely agree that there is an overwhelming case for violating that confidence. On the other hand, if one was told by one's best friend that she cheated on a major exam, or lied to avoid selective service, or embezzled a small amount ofmoney from the school, we might equally want to say that although these actions were unjust to other students or

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draftees, but that there are very strong reasons not to betray the confidence. In these 60 cases, it might be agreed that one value dearly outweighs the other. Berlin and Williams insist, however, that there may be cases where these values do come into incommensurable conflict. 61 Imagine, for example, that through an undetected negligence one's child or one's friend has caused someone a serious harm should you tum them in? Imagine one's child is planning to dodge the draft - should you report him? These sorts of conflicts can play out at a social or nationallevel as weIl. Imagine a case where a nation is obliged to go to war according to a treaty obligation to an old and treasured ally but discovers in time that the cause or prosecution of the war is deeply unjust. What takes precedence here, the loyalty to the ally or the sense ofjustice? Berlin and Williams' point is that the answer will depend very much on the details, but it is perfectly plausible that the kinds of daims in conflict will in sorne scenarios be wholly incommensurable, that we will not know how to go about measuring them against one another. These are the kinds of questions about which there is bound to be deep disagreement. Of course, a great deal will tum on the details, and this is part of Berlin' s case: "The concrete situation is almost everything.,,62 As he puts it elsewhere "in the concrete situations, not all daims are of equal weight.,,63 Conflicts between values then must be continually worked out in terms of particular cases. The precise relationship between values in a given case cannot be known in advance. It is for this reason Berlin and Williams assert that "there is no ... general determinate procedure for solving cont1icts, such as a lexical priority rule,"64 "no single overarching standard or criterion" goveming value cont1icts. 65 As he puts it canonically, To assume that all values can be graded on a scale, so that it is a mere matter of inspection to determine the highest, seems to me to falsify our knowledge that men are free agents, to represent moral decision as an operation a slide-rule could in principle perform. 66 Berlin's discussion of particular cases of conflicting values does suggest, however, that in extreme cases, where what might be termed the minimal threshold of an ultimate value is engaged, even in relation to a very different value, a commensurability is often perceptible. One particular daim may recognizably outweigh another. Justice may outweigh 10yaltY' or vice versa. Of course, this need not necessarily be the case, and the
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possibility of a tragic conflict oftwo or more minimal thresholds remains a possibility. What is essential from Berlin's perspective is to respect the particularities of specific cases, and not simply to impose presumed overarching rules or standards.
It is important to note, however, that Berlin does not leave the values he perceives

in a totally undistinguished heap. He does distinguish broadly and tentatively between different kinds of values or goods, some of which he distinguishes as ultimate values or 'Great Goods', particularly within a given culture. He writes of a range of "ends equally ultimate, equally sacred [which] may contradict each other....,,67 These ultimate values or 'Great Goods' represent a set ofultimate and rivalrous guiding values which give some shape or contour to Berlin's pluralism. Together, these represent the "priorities, never absolute or final, [which] must be established.,,68 This is not to say that such values can never be superseded by non-ultimate values or an elaborate combination thereof - as Kekes observes, pluralists allow that is at least possible that they could be. 69 It is, however, to recognize that Berlin has every reason to reject Crowder's suggestion that his pluralism holds all values as necessarily equal. 70 Similarly, Berlin's insistence on justice and equality as ultimate values, values-in-themselves, as well as his hostility to the monist notion of a summum bonum seems to cut against Gray's suggestion that he treats self-creation as a supreme value. Finally, the consistency with which Berlin propounds the idea of equally ultimate values (indeed, its integral status as his own basic model) throughout his work casts doubt on Mack' s suggestion that his core commitment to pluralism was a late development in his thought. To summarize the descriptive aspect of Berlin's pluralism then, he offers a vision of diverse values, including ultimate values, embraced in various combinations by many societies, groups, and individuals. Often these ultimate values and sub-values, will be rivalrous, incommensurable and incompatible. In essence, we are faced in a great many particular cases with rival, pluralistic values, some of them ultimate. This will seem, 1 think, not a wholly far-fetched way ofunderstanding modern Western nations - as simultaneously committed to a range ofultimate, defining values - such as liberty, equality, democracy, justice, community (and even some sub-concepts thereof)71 - which may come into conflict with one another, but to which we feel ourselves as societies intricately bound. 72 This will hold for many people as individuals as well, although we

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may want to define the range of relevant values somewhat more widely and flexibly, to include, for example, fairness, sincerity, loyalty, faith, love, authenticity, success, and others, depending on the individual. Sorne ofthese will in many cases constitute ultimate or constitutive values which we cannot lose or cease to value without in sorne profound sense changing who we are. Yet they may also conflict, and be incommensurable and incompatible. If this is not the only way of seeing our situations, or it is not felt to apply to everyone, or all societies, it nevertheless does not appear unreasonable, and indeed exhibits a great deal of plausibility, coherence, and explanatory scope. 1think that Berlin is arguing that this represents the best interpretation of our contemporary situation in the modern West in general. More than that, 1 think he argues that it is a good condition, one he hopes to persuade us to see as worthy of preservation. ln this sense, Berlin seems to be committed, like Martha Nussbaum and Bernard Williams, in the latter's words, to embracing "notjust the fact ofexposure [to moral pluralism], but also of its value. ,,73 It is in this sense that he defends 'the ideal of pluralism' against monist competitors/ and why he embraces "Mill's plea for novel 'experiments in living. ",75 Berlin writes, "1 believe that variety is part of human existence, and in fact ... that this is a valuable attribute, though that is a very late idea, probably not to be met much before the eighteenth century.,,76 Bernard Williams captures this aspect of Berlin's thought when he argues in the introduction to Concepts
4

and Categories that for Berlin "the consciousness of the plurality of values is itself a
good.... ,,77 In defense ofthis position, Berlin makes a number of suggestionscharacteristically, not systematically or comprehensively - as to why he thinks that pluralism itself constitutes an ultimate value: (i.) it is valuable in itself, as an exploration of human possibilities, experiments in living, or as an exfoliation ofhuman potential, generating a richer, more diverse world;78 (ii.) it is valuable in view of the range of values which we treasure for their own sakes which it allows us to embrace in their full significance;79 (iii.) it is valuable as an expression of human freedom on the one hand, and as an extension of the range of freedom, of choice-making, on the other;80 (iv.) it is valuable as a condition, in Berlin's view, ofphilosophy and self-understanding;8\ (v.) it is valuable in-so-far as at its best, it supports compassion, civility, and a modest, humane, open-minded disposition, and no doubt for many other reasons that 1have overlooked. 82

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On the basis of these points, Berlin argues that pluralism is a worthier ideal than monism. Of course, this argument itself presupposes a degree of commensurability between pluralism and monism. This is, however, is fully consistent with Berlin's claim that values may or may not be commensurable. It is also worth noting that in arguing that pluralism is a more plausible and compelling value than monism, Berlin does not necessarily contend that it is a supreme or overriding value, as is sometimes suggested. His argument appears to be that it is a plausible ultimate value held by at least sorne people, such as himself, in modern Western societies, and so worthy of inclusion among the loose and open-ended range of our ultimate values. In summary then, Berlin's strong pluralism involves (1) the rejection of the ideal of a perfect human society. (2) It implies the possibility of radical and even tragic conflicts of value. (3) It suggests that in such conflicts reason is incapable of determining an outcome. (4) It is incompatible with any overarching principle of moral life. It focuses rather on arbitration of values in particular cases. (5) It is incompatible with the notion of a rigid hierarchy of values. (6) It does, however, allow for a loose, open-ended and revisable set of equally ultimate guiding values. (7) It can be defended not only as a description of our moral condition, but also as itself a valuable condition, worthy of preservation. This discussion leads us back around then to the main question - is Berlin's pluralism conducive to a sharp priority for liberty, or more specifically negative liberty?
It should be clarified immediately, however, that there already is a sense in which liberty,

and especially negative liberty, is already secured, for Berlin unquestionably argues for the recognition ofliberty, including negative liberty, among the ultimate values of the modern West. Now, this is not to say that it could not be overridden to sorne degree by other values or combinations of values, but this will be contingent on the arguments that can be brought to bear in the given case. Moreover, to override core elements of such an uitimate value, one would have to, in Berlin's view, offer very forceful reasons relating to core elements of other ultimate values or combinations thereof, such as say equality, justice and community. Berlin develops, for example, a case for universal public education at the primary and secondary levels on the basis of daims of social justice and equality, as well as ofproviding the conditions of liberty, although he thinks that this

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would involve a significant constraint on the negative liberty of parents. 83 Berlin certainly allows that liberty can be overridden by other values. The point at issue here is something different. The question is whether Berlin's pluralist view is conducive to an a priori guarantee of either an extensive range of, or of a core of, liberty. Can a particular value act to "constrain" or "restrain" of pluralism. Since liberty will be explored in detail in the next section, at this point the question can be framed in terms of whether this seems plausible for any value. In the first place, (i.) it is very difficult to see how, having formulated so encompassing an argument for "the notion of a plurality of values not structured hierarchically," Berlin could now restrain it to allow an insulated, overriding authority to one particular value. If (ii.) the value in question is defined as equally ultimate, then it would appear, prima facie, that it should be accorded the same respect as other equally ultimate values. In addition, (iii.) we have aiready seen Berlin assert that in value conflicts, and particularly in deep conflicts, there can be "no general principled solution," and this seems to prec1ude any permanent framework preceding or regulating value conflicts. Indeed, (iv.) the idea ofproviding a sharp prior guarantee for one ultimate value, whether narrow or wide, seems wholly out of sympathy with his call for 'a logically untidy, flexible, and even ambiguous compromise,' as well as (v.) with his emphasis on the contingency of individual cases. Now, Berlin is not against any possible priority - he writes "Priorities, never final and absolute, must be established
_,,84

but he is

(vi.) c1early against any sharply presumptive general priorities, such as a guarantee of one value or a core thereof. What his multiple, provisional and contingent priorities seem to be are general, flexible guidelines recognizing the importance of a range of ultimate values, but subject to open contestation and exceptions in particular cases, as well as to general reinterpretation or reevaluation over the longer term. He emphasizes (vii.), in particular, that there is no rational means for authoritatively speciying the parameters of such prioritics in advance. (viii.) ln this section, 1 also touched on, but did not develop. the suggestion that negative liberty is itself intemally pluralistic, so that it does not offer any c1ear parameter according to which pluralism could be constrained, but itself exhibits pluralism. Moreover, (ix.) Berlin wams of abnormal circumstances where even such provisional and contingent priorities may have to be laid generally aside.

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It is undoubtedly the lack of any substantive support for sharp priorities for an

extensive negative liberty, or even for a narrower but similarly sharp priority for a core of negative liberty, which has led defenders ofthis interpretation to look to a theory of human nature for support - although Berlin explicitly closes this source off, emphasizing that there is no political value of liberty inhering in humans as SUCh85 - or to attribute to him sorne teleological view ofhuman progress. These dubious appeals, however, defy his own critiques ofteleology as well as his modest but consistent historicism, and threaten to undermine the coherence of his thought. Berlin denies any teleological view of progress, and there seems precious little explicit evidence of it in his work. There remains the possibility, however, that, in defiance ofhis own historicist and pluralist framework, Berlin wants to treat the idea ofliberty, or negative liberty, in sorne special way. The following section investigates Berlin's treatment ofliberty.

4.iii Liberty as an Ultimate Value

The last section introduced Berlin's idea of strong pluralism as identifying an open-ended range of equally ultimate values with special reference to whether it seemed to leave room for a special privilege for liberty, or more particularly for negative liberty. This section continues and extends that investigation, but now focusing on an exposition and analysis of Berlin' s treatment of liberty itself. The main question considered in this section is whether Berlin extends a special priority, distinct from other ultimate values, in his direct treatment of negative liberty? ln other words, does it mark a limit to the pluralism of values? Does Berlin seek to insulate negative liberty, or a core thereof, as liberal interpreters claim, from the rivalry of pluralistic values, ideals and ends? 1 will argue that a careful examination of Berlin's treatment of liberty confirms that he does not. The widespread impression that he does so is founded on a few textual references that 1 will consider at the end of the section. 1 will argue that when these remarks are read in context, they are consistent with the claim that Berlin' s ideal of pluralism encompasscs negative liberty as an ultimate value (along with justice, equality and others) and by consequence extends no protection to it that is not extended to other ultimate values. 1will argue that Berlin's attitude to positive liberty is in fact far more sympathetic than has been generally acknowledged, and his attitude to negative liberty is more restrained. These sub-concepts of liberty are treated as equally ultimate values

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which need to be held in an equilibrium. This investigation of Berlin's treatment of liberty confirms the character and consistency of Berlin's strong pluralism, and thereby cuts indirectly against the alternative formulations ofhis pluralism, as either inconsistent, as treating all values equally, or as extending a supreme value to self-creation. 1will argue that while it is perfectly true that Berlin believed that to reduce negative liberty beyond certain frontiers degrades human beings - "to overstep them leads to inhumanity,,86 - that this is, however, no less true of other ultimate values, such as justice and equality and community, and even positive liberty. This is part ofwhat it means to call something an ultimate value. To be deprived of it utterly cannot help but do damage. Still, this implies only that negative liberty is an ultimate value, among others. However, Berlin's frequent defenses ofthis point in relation to negative liberty have no doubt contributed to the widespread impression that he did want to extend it sorne special privilege. Berlin distinguishes between two concepts of liberty - negative and positive. The argument that negative liberty is privileged in Berlin's view, either all the way to a minimum of social justice, or more narrowly in terms of its core, and that it places a corresponding restraint on the pluralism of values, must rely on two privileges: first, it requires an external privilege over other values, and, second, an internaI privilege over positive liberty. 1will argue that on careful examination neither privilege is evident in Berlin's writing. In essence, Berlin advances, once again, his interpretive understanding of our pluralist condition. This pluralist condition encompasses negative liberty rather than being bound by it. The first issue on the agenda then is a consideration of the status ofliberty among the ultimate values. The argument here is, laying aside initially the internaI structure of liberty (and the question ofwhether negative liberty has a sharp priority), that liberty in general is treated by Berlin as an ultimate value among others. The section then moves on to consider the internaI structure of liberty, particularly whether negative liberty is attributed a structural primacy over positive liberty. This inquiry begins by examining Berlin' s understanding of negative, positive, and basic or fundamental politicalliberty and their relationship. It then considers Berlin's famous critique of positive liberty, followed by his critique of negative liberty. Finally, these critical inquiries are followed

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by an analysis of Berlin's statements widely interpreted to imply a special status for negative liberty. The first question then is the status of liberty - laying aside its internaI structure in relation to ultimate values. The issue of particular interest here is whether liberty is encompassed within the clash ofultimate values, or is mainly, or in part, insulated from these rivalries? Berlin continually refers to examples of liberty clashing with other basic values, including equality, justice, mercy or compassion, glory, happiness, security, public order, and others, and characteristically suggests that these conflicts have to be worked out in relation to particular cases and not according to overarching principles. 87 Berlin's point is not that such values or ideals, or their underlying models, are wholly incompatible, so that embracing one requires the wholesale elimination of the others, but rather that the full forms in which they are embraced as ultimate cannot always be simultaneously respected, so that one must yield to the other in essential respects. 1will quote only three brief examples here of a wide range of references, but it may be noted that a number of other passages stressing the clash of liberty with other values are quoted throughout the text: But beyond all these [internaI conflicts ofliberty] there is an acuter issue: the paramount need to satisfy the claims ofother, no less ultimate, values: justice, happiness, love, the realization of caEacities to create new things and experiences and ideas, the discovery of the truth. 8 [ia] Both liberty and equality are among the primary goals pursued by human beings through many centuries; but total liberty for the wolves is death to the lambs, total liberty of the powerful, the gifted, is not compatible with the rights to a decent existence of the weak and the less gifted .... Equality may demand the restraint ofthe liberty ofthose who wish to dominate .. .. 89 [ia] The extent ofa man 's, or a people 's, liberty to choose to live as he or they desire must be weighed against the claims ofmany other values, ofwhich equality, or justice, or happiness, or security or public order are perhaps the most obvious examples. 90 [ia] Indeed, the focus of Berlin's essay "From Hope and Fear Set Free" is that liberty and knowledge may clash incommensurably. The impression produced by all of the references to liberty, and particularly liberty in its negative sense as non-interference, of liberty clashing openly with other values is re-enforced by the studies of particular anti-

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liberal thinkers of the modern West, including Hamann, Marx, de Maistre, and many romantics, who in Berlin's interpretation do not invest liberty, and particularly its negative sense, with ultimate significance, but do so invest other values, such as equality, justice and self-creation. 91 1 conclude then, that liberty in general is treated as one equally ultimate value among others, all capable of colliding, and enjoying no special status. In order to fully grasp the status ofnegative liberty in Berlin's thought, it is necessary to explore the internaI division of liberty he proposes in his "Two Concepts of Liberty" essay. Such an exploration, 1 will argue, will reveal that while there is a sense in which Berlin argues that negative liberty has historically been less perverted, especially at a conceptuallevel, than sorne forms of positive liberty, this historical difference does not effect their status as equally ultimate human values. Berlin argues that over-reliance on either concept ofliberty, particularly to the exclusion of the other, encourages the degeneration and abuse of the concept and its corresponding value. What he seems to feel is necessary is to remain open to both values, and to strike an uneasy, flexible balance between the two. In this situation, each acts to limit the degenerative tendencies of the other. This conclusion is fully consonant with the pluralistic ideal that Berlin indicates he is anxious to defend in this essay. In terms of the initial question of the internaI structure of liberty, and particularly whether there is a sharp hierarchy structurally privileging negative liberty, the answer, 1 will argue, is that there is none. The first two terms, positive and negative liberty, have already been mentioned, but not clearly explained in any detail. Berlin presents these two concepts as answers to two questions: negative liberty answers the question "how much am l governed?" and positive freedom the question of "by whom am 1 governed?"92 Negative liberty is then concerned with "the area within a man can act unobstructed by others." It implies not being subject to "the deliberate interference of other human beings in the area within which 1 could otherwise act." It is "simply not to be prevented by other persons from doing whatever one wishes.',93 Negative liberty includes "basic human rights (always a negative notion: a wall against oppressors), including that of free expression and association,,,94 and, presumably, other basic freedoms. These freedoms establish a realm of private choice.

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It is important to immediately call to attention two features of this negative

concept: first, as Gray emphasizes,95 this type ofliberty includes the freedom to do bad things as well as good, foolish as well as wise, mean as well as generous;96 Berlin approvingly quotes Bentham on this point, indeed as having "said the last word": "The liberty of doing evil, is it not liberty? If it is not liberty, what is it then?,,97 Berlin then agrees with Bentham that alllaws are by their natures infringements of negative liberty. This view of negative liberty leads to two sub-points. The first is that Berlin begins with a very clear and uncompromising notion of negative liberty as intentionally (and even unintentional but foreseeably98) unobstructed opportunity to action which he thinks that we value for itself, and which he is anxious to avoid conflating on the one hand with other values - "equality, justice, happiness, love, creation and other ends men seek for their own sakes,,99 - and, on the other hand, with what he regards as the "conditions of its exercise," 100 such as access to resources, education and health. These latter may be very valuable and worthy as well, but they are not, in his view, the same thing as negative liberty itself. The second point is that a pluralism enters into the idea of negative liberty itself. In essence, we cannot achieve complete negative liberty without the elimination of law itself. The elimination of law, however, leaves negative liberty unprotected and unregulated, so that it is prey to arbitrary imposition. The consequence is that we must choose areas in which negative liberty is to be protected, and formulate laws to thus protect it, but there is nothing in the idea of negative liberty itself which dictates what these must be. An argument for negative liberty in one realm of life may always be introduced against a claim for it in another. The areas where negative liberty is most important, however, must have recourse to the particular situation, and to other values which may be enhanced or diminished by its formulation. This does not mean that negative liberty is coterminous with other values, but that it is internally pluralistic and, while a distinct value unto itself, in practice integrally bound up with other values. 101 Both of these latter conclusions militate against the thesis that negative liberty could mark a hard limit to pluralism, or be somehow insulated from it. The second general point, on the other hand, marks perhaps the most important reason that Berlin has in fact been interpreted as extending sorne special status to negative liberty. Berlin argues that there is an undefined minimum that "the demand for

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negative liberty entails.,,102 This minimum is what "men require if. .. dehumanization is to be averted.,,103 Nonetheless, Berlin also affirms that Nothing that 1 assert in this essay on the two concepts of liberty about the frontiers of individualliberty in any of its meanings is either inviolable, or . or III suffilClent, . sorne sense abso lute. \04 So for Berlin there is an undefined minimum threshold of negative liberty which marks the frontiers across which lie inhumanity and dehumanization. This frontier is nonetheless not characterized as inviolable or absolute. Evidently, this is a point to which we will have to return in considering those statements which have been thought to indicate that Berlin sought to secure or insulate at least a core or minimum of individual or negative liberty from the insecurities of pluralism. For the moment, it must suffice to observe that, despite the implication of potential dehumanization, Berlin does not argue that even this minimum should be viewed as either inviolable or absolute. One final point which requires commentary here is the manner in which Berlin employs the term 'rights.' Since the range of minimum negative liberty is not disclosed, it is not clear to what degree the "rights" of expression and association (which Berlin attaches to negative liberty in general) are to be included within the frontiers of minimal negative liberty. In sorne degree, this will no doubt depend on the concrete case. Nonetheless, even ifthey are included in their entirety, it is important to note that they are by that same token not absolute or inviolable, nor necessarily constrained only by conflict with other 'rights'. As Berlin elsewhere confirms, he does not use the language of rights in this special sense, but rather to denote the most powerful claims flowing most directly out of what he regards as ultimate values. 105 Positive freedom, by contrast with negative, is concerned with self-mastery, with "the wish on the part of the individual to be his own master." It asks "Who is to say what

1 am, and what 1 am not, to be or do?" and "What am 1 free to be or dO?,,106 It says "1
wish my life and decisions to depend on myself, not on external forces of whatever kind." 107 1 may choose to let someone else set the mIes for me, but the question remains to what degree these arrangements depend on or reflect myself. Positive freedom is essentially the freedom to realize the form of life 1 choose. It is vitally concerned then with my social environment and institutions, with the kinds of mIes and regulations that

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empower and constrain me, and with the issue of the political system, of who mIes, and whether this mIe ref1ects in any way my will or identity. 1t is positive freedom that underpins, for example, demands for liberty both in the sense of democracy and in the sense of national-self-determination. Finally, there is the fundamental or basic sense of political freedom: "the fundamental sense of freedom is freedom from chains, from imprisonment, from enslavement by others. The rest is extension ofthis sense, or else metaphor.,,108 This is what Berlin calls elsewhere the "common kernel" or central meaning of the term which is essential to avoid distortion. 109 It represents the common source ofboth political forms ofliberty, positive and negative. The basic political sense is defined in the negative, by what it is not. To be free is not to be enslaved or imprisoned. Slavery, imprisonment and chains represent comprehensive suppressions of liberty, both positive and negative. They prevent one from being self-governing, and radically diminish, if not eliminate, the possibilities or doors open to one uninhibited by others. Positive and negative liberty define themselves in different ways in contrast to the state of 'unfreedom' - positive liberty seeks to ensure a self-mIe or self-realization, and negative liberty to ensure a private space of self-control. Both are legitimate responses to the threat of unfreedom, and it is only at the point where they contradict this essential significance, where they become vehicles of arbitrary arrest and incarceration, or slavery, of comprehensive suppressions of choice, of bullying and human degradation, that they become perverse expressions of liberty. In his "Two Concepts of Liberty," Berlin explores, at least broadly, the historical development ofthese two distinct concepts ofliberalism and their rivalry. He argues that they initially appear as "concepts no great logical distance from one another - no more than negative or positive ways of saying the same thing." 110 The questions ... cannot be kept wholly distinct. 1 wish to determine myself, and not be directed by others, no matter how wise and benevolent; my conduct derives an irreplaceable value from the sole fact that it is my own, and not . Impose d upon me. 111 Berlin argues that the idea of positive freedom is the oIder and that negative liberty is the younger, a distinctly modern concept, which emerges out of the older concept. 112 Initially, in their cmdest formulations, the two concepts generally found themselves
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ranged against the same enemies - slavery, subjection, deprivation, humiliation, oppression, absence of recognition. In essence, they share an immediate demand for sorne possibility of choice, or control. \ 13 The two concepts appear initially as allies, in a common battle against human degradation: ... those who have ever valued liberty for its own sake believed that to be free to choose, and not to be chosen for, is an inalienable ingredient in what makes human beings human; and that this underlies both the positive demand to have a voice in the laws and practices of the society in which one lives, and to be accorded an area, artificially carved out, if need be, in which one is one's own master, a 'negative' area in which a man is not obliged to account for his activities to any man so far as this is compatible with the existence of organized society. \ 14 [ia] Here Berlin indicates that basic liberty suggests at least a degree of both positive and negative liberty, although how these are to be balanced is unclear. To an extent, the concepts are at least potentially complementary, even ifthey have grown to often be rivaIs in particular cases. Short of perversion, they still share the same root idea. Berlin famously argues that the positive sense of liberty is peculiarly susceptible, at least in certain variations, of perversion in relation to the common kernel at the core of the idea offreedom. As Berlin's earlier commentary indicated, however, the object ofhis critique is not positive liberty per se, but the exploitation of certain forms of positive liberty by "ruthless monisms." What is essential to notice is that the argument is not directed at positive liberty per se, and by no means covers all claims to positive liberty. Positive liberty was identified as an ideal of self-mastery. It said "1 wish my life and decisions to depend on myself, not on external forces of whatever kind." The idea of positive freedom, however, may also exploit the intuition that self-realization can be blocked internally as well as externally, by one's own ignorance or weakness of character or conflicting passions or prior socialization. While this argument reveals distinct insight into human psychology, and Berlin himself accepts it as identifying a legitimate obstacle to freedom, 115 it also carries positive freedom into a dangerous realm, particularly when the idea of authentic will is, as it may be, connected with a monistic ideal or formulation of the authentic self - so that there is one true aspect ofthe self which alone properly realizes a human being. The self can then be divided into a higher self, which embodies a person's true will, and a lower self, which acts as an obstacle to the realization of the true

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self - whether a false consciousness, or the weak and sinful flesh, or the chains of socialization and indoctrination. This conception of positive freedom may then be brought to justify whatever is considered necessary to the realization of the higher self. 116 The idea of the higher self may also be, identified not with any particular person, but with larger groups, societies and historical movements: The 'positively' free self... may be inflated into sorne super-personal entity - a State, a class, a nation, or the march of history itself, regarded as the more 'real' subject of attributes than the empirical self.... the 'higher' self duly became identified with institutions, churches, nations, races, states, classes, cultures, parties, and with vaguer entities, such as the general will, the common good, the enlightened forces of society, the vanguard of the most progressive class, .~ . M anllest D estmy. 117 This true self alone is essential to making people free; other considerations can be safely disregarded, even if the people themselves (in their distorted consciousness) raise them. 118 ln this manner positive liberty has frequently been "liable to perversion," when connected with certain monist premises: Once 1 take this view, 1 am in a position to ignore the actual wishes of men or societies, to bully, oppress, torture them in the name, and on behalf, oftheir 'real' selves, in the secure knowledge that whatever is the true goal of man (happiness, performance of duty, wisdom, ajust society, self-fulfillment) must be identical with this freedom - the free choice ofhis 'true', albeit often submerged and inarticulate, self. 119 The lower self of the individual or society (generally the empirical or everyday self) thus becomes an obstacle to realization of the true (generally, although not exclusively, rational) self - in other words, the lower selfbecomes an obstacle to self-realization. With this argument, an exponent of positive liberty puts himself in a position to reveal the true nature of freedom through the higher, albeit submerged (often rational), self and to ignore whatever protestations might be made by the poor, lower or empirical selves. It allows for a coercion that 'monstrously impersonates' the freedom of the coerced. In this way it not only eradicates the range ofnegative liberty but also betrays the essential core of free choice which is the common heritage of both concepts of liberty, and indeed justifies, at the extreme, domination, imprisonment, and enslavement as instrumentalities to achieve the authentic freedom of the internally oppressed individual, society or class.

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As Berlin himself indicates in the introduction to Four Essays on Liberty, it is not positive liberty itself which is the object of his critique, but forms of aggressive monism which may inform it: "If my essay has any polemical thrust, it is to discredit metaphysical constructions ofthis kind.,,120 In "Two Concepts of Liberty," where Berlin most notoriously advances this critique, he indicates that he has primarily in mind Kantian transcendental rationalism, which he regards as having been graduaUy transfigured by historical steps into the foundation for "pure totalitarian doctrine,,,121 both the fascist and above aU the Soviet interpretation of Marx. Yet in order to be susceptible of this sort of perversion, the doctrine of positive liberty must have a range of features and proceed through a number of steps. It must be a closed monistic conception, it must adopt the metaphor of internaI obstacles to freedom and the true self, it must identify itself, or at least be susceptible of identification with large groups or societies and, at the limit, humanity.122 Kant's thought may indeed have exhibited aU these qualities. The last point seems the most problematic. There is, as Berlin's notes, a "severe individualism,,123 in Kant's thought, as weU as a deeply-rooted distaste for paternalism l24 which had to be suppressed in the course of its transposition, but there is also a distinct universalism, a claim to have solved the problem ofhuman reason and morals for aU people, at aU times and places, indeed, if Kant is to be taken at his word, for aU rational beings. 125 This latter feature may certainly have super-personal identification. The essential point, however, is that however chilling the transformation of Kant's thought, or indeed ofmonistic rationalism in general, into perverse forms of positive liberty, the critique need not extend to aU claims of positive liberty, as Berlin indicates in the foUowing passage: l should like to begin by a rebuttal ofMr. West's aUegation that l imply that any conception of positive freedom must involve a potentiaUy tyrannical 'reification' of the self. This is not so. l did not say that the concept of positive freedom itself, only the perverted interpretations of it, can lead, and indeed have led, to such consequences. Positive freedom or liberty is an unimpeachable human value. 126 This concern does not, for example, lead Berlin to be skeptical of demands for democratic self-determination, or forms of positive liberty which do not seek a hierarchy in the self or individual or group claims for self-realization which do not seek to impose themselves on the manifest will of the individual, or which do not turn exclusively on internaI psychological constraints to liberty.

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Indeed, despite the susceptibility of certain conceptions of positive liberty to degeneration, and contrary to many standard readings (especially of the liberal types), Berlin continuously defends positive liberty as an ultimate human value along with negative liberty. This is apparent, contrary to the great bulk of commentary, in "Two Concepts of Liberty" where Berlin declares Indeed, l have tried to show that it is the notion of freedom in its 'positive' sense which is at the heart of the demands for national or social self-direction which animate the mostpowerful and morally just public movements ofour time, and that not to recognize this is to misunderstand the most vital facts and ideas of our age. 127 [ia] Indeed, Berlin stresses that in his estimate positive and negative liberty have an " ... equal right to be classed among the deepest interests ofmankind.,,128 [ia] Moreover, Berlin returns emphatically to this point in his discussion and defense of the essay in the lengthy "Introduction" to Four Essays on Liberty: Positive freedom, conceived as the answer to the question, 'by whom am l governed?', is a valid universal goal. l do not know why l have been held to doubt this, or, for that matter, the further proposition, that democratic selfgovernment is a fundamental human need, something valuable in and ofitself, whether or not it clashes with the claims ofnegative liberty or ofany other goal... valuable intrinsically .... 129 [ia] Later in the introduction, Berlin repeatedly returns to this protest: l should like to say once again to my critics that the issue is not one between negative freedom as an absolute value, and other, inferior values. It is more complex and more painful. One freedom may abort another... positive and negative liberty may collide .... 130 [ia] Negative and positive liberty are not the same thing. Both are ends in themselves. These ends may clash irreconcilably. . .. If the claims of two (or more than two) types of liberty prove incompatible in a particular case ... at once absolute and incommensurable, it is better to face this intellectually uncomfortable fact than to ignore it, or automatically attribute it to some deficiency on our part... or, what is worse still, suppress one of the competing values altogether by pretending that it is identical with its rival - and so end by distorting both. Yet, it appears 10 me, it is exactly this that philosophical monists ... have done and are still doing. 131 [ia] Berlin consistently repeats this refrain, although he also characteristically accepts some responsibility for the widespread misunderstanding ofhis view, for example: Negative liberty is basic; positive liberty is also basic. They are both perfectly
ISI

good forms of liberty which we all pursue. 1 am not at all against positive liberty.... 1 agree 1 ought to have made it clearer [in "Two Concepts of Liberty"] 132 that positive liberty is as noble and basic an ideal as negative. [ia] Berlin's work is filled with clear efforts to clarify his position; for example, "it is wrong to accuse me ofbeing against positive liberty," and "positive liberty is essential to a decent existence" [ia]; "Participation in self-government is, like justice, a basic human requirement, an end in itself.,,133 In other words, the repression of positive liberty beyond a certain minimal threshold produces an indecent and degraded existence. Berlin' s point is not to exalt negative over positive liberty, but to seek to illuminate two legitimate senses of liberty as aspects of a recognizable pluralism of values and concepts - if one is more dangerous in certain forms, that renders it no less legitimate, but rather caUs, in his estimate, for an uneasy but necessary balancing act. In summary then, Berlin argues that certain forms of monistic positive liberty have historicaUy demonstrated themselves as susceptible to a certain kind of transposition which carries them into conflict with their own root form or basic sense, rendering them perverse. These doctrines "became a favored weapon of despotism" 134 and have been employed to override respect for negative liberty, and even basic politicalliberty, often with terrible human consequences. However, while this historical and conceptual analysis provides good reasons to resist the ascendancy of certain types of monistic positive liberty, and indeed to embrace pluralist orientations more conducive to the recognition of a range of ultimate values including negative liberty, it does not impeach the status of positive liberty in general as an ultimate human value. Indeed, Berlin declares strikingly in Four Essays on Liberty that ifhis own work is interpreted as "closer to positive than to negative liberty, 1 shaU offer no great objection...." 135 By the same token, Berlin advances a critique of negative liberty and its degenerate forms which has received too little critical attention. Indeed, he stresses that exploitation by despots "could equally have been the fate of the doctrine of negative liberty.,,136 If, however, negative liberty has more often escaped exploitation at the hands of despots, it has not done so entirely, and it has sometimes allowed for exploitation of another kind. Indeed, Berlin explains his own lack of emphasis on the dangers of an exclusive emphasis on negative liberty by protesting "the bloodstained theory of

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economic individualism and unrestrained capitalist competition does not, l should have thought, today need stressing.,,137 Berlin believes that, particularly in isolation, negative liberty can be formulated so as to be compatible with "sorne kinds of autocracy, or at any rate the absence of self-government" 138 (in other words, it is compatible with a wide variety of non-democratic, even non-liberal regimes), which can in turn lead to concentration of social and political and ultimately economic power which effectively evacuate the meaning of legal protections. Even when negative liberty happens to be matched with a liberal-democratic political structure, it can stilllead to "... extremes of exploitation, brutality and injustice." 139 "It is doubtless well to remember that belief in negative freedom is compatible with, and (so far as ideas influence conduct) has played its part in generating great and lasting social evils." 140 The pure doctrine of negative liberty is susceptible to the following objections: first, pure negative freedom's prohibition of direct human intervention in a certain realm of personal choice is fully compatible with a wide range of types of political, social and economic arrangements, sorne of which may have the effect of undermining the conditions of the exercise ofliberty, so that the individual freedoms negative liberty protects become mere empty forms. 141 As Berlin was fond of observing: "Freedom for the wolves has often meant death for the sheep.,,142 Second, Berlin argues that If degrees of freedom were a function of the satisfaction of desires, l could increase freedom as effectively by eliminating desires as by satisfying them. l could render men (including myself) free by conditioning them into losing the original desires which l have decided not to satisfy.143 In this way, the individual's desires may, in the extreme, not be interfered with at all simply because they lack any desires - or they may lack certain desires because they have been discouraged or suppressed or constrained or otherwise manipulated. Since the negative concept of liberty does not specify what desires, which ways of life, which freedoms, require protection, it is all too easily transformed into its opposite. Berlin tries to mitigate this danger by refining the definition ofnegative liberty. He does so in terms of "how many possibilities are open to me" without human interference (although methods of counting remain perforce impressionistic), how important these "doors" are to 144 Still, in-so-far as negative liberty remains reliant on what l me, and other qualities. consider to be important opportunities it remains susceptible of manipulation. 145
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These two dangers are most threatening when they are considered together. The polarization of social and economic and political power may complement and re-enforce, either deliberately or naturally, differential expectations offreedom, which in turn reenforce these inequalities, aH within the bounds of the forms of negative liberty. Berlin connects this degenerate possibility particularly with the "reign of unfettered economic indivdualism" in nineteenth century England. Thus, "Each concept seems liable to perversion into the very vice it was created to resist," oppression. Ifthere is, however, a sense in which negative liberty, particularly taken in isolation, can be employed as a c10ak for terrible exploitation and domination, it is nonetheless not easily susceptible to the same level of perversion, at least in terms of its conceptual roots, as is positive liberty. The characteristic degeneration of negative liberty, at least historically, is the erosion of the conditions of its exercise. The forms of liberty are evacuated ofmeaning by the elimination or control of the means oftheir exercise - yet the forms, the legal constraint on intervention and the legal protections of individual choice, remain, although perhaps greatly enfeebled. In this way, the degenerate form of negative liberty does not betray its root sense of allowing sorne choice. The perverse or degenerate forms of positive liberty, by contrast, transform liberty itself into the justification of coercion and repression. Berlin's argument, however, is not the facile one that has sometimes been attributed to him - that we have a good reason to embrace negative liberty simply because in its perverse form it is marginally less awful. It is rather, to begin with, that each form of liberty is a legitimate ultimate human value, and while they share a common root, they are nonetheless very different and sometimes incommensurable and incompatible metaphorical extensions of that root meaning. Each offers its own promise and its own danger - "Emphasis on negative liberty, as a rule, leaves more paths for individuals or groups to pursue; positive liberty, as a rule, opens fewer paths, but with better reasons or
grc~ter resources for moving along them; the two may or may not c1ash.,,146 Each of

these forms of liberty is a distinct and valid goal in itself, but there is also an important sense in which each also acts as a corrective against the degenerative tendencies of the other - positive liberty is valuable because "without it, negative liberty may be too easily crushed" or evacuated of meaning, while on the other hand, a secure commitment to

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negative liberty constrains whatever coercive tendencies that foment in positive liberty. What Berlin is after is a recognition of real diversity of ultimate values, and the need for the flexible and uneasy balancing of one against the other. Thus he concludes: The case for intervention, by the state or other effective agencies, to secure the conditions for both positive, and at least a minimum degree ofnegative liberty for individuals, is overwhelmingly strong. 147 [ia] Negative liberty must be curtailed if positive liberty is to be sufficiently realized; there must be a balance between the two, about which no clear principle can be enunciated. Positive and negative liberty are both perfectly vaUd concepts. 148 [ia] Rather than a direct defense of negative liberty, the dynamic of the argument seems to be that the uneasy equilibrium with, on one hand, the protection of liberty it provides, but on the other the danger of deep conflict, or radical and tragic choice that it produces, is a better and more tenable position than either extreme. This central case for the recognition of pluralism does nonetheless indirectly entail a degree of support for negative liberty, for it is recognized as an ultimate value, but within the range of pluralism, not outside it. This argument for pluralism provides the context in which the passages in which Berlin has been widely interpreted as taking an absolute stand on negative liberty must be read. For example, one such passage near the end of "Two Concepts of Liberty" reads 1 must establish a society in which there must be sorne frontiers of freedom which nobody should be permitted to cross. Different names or natures may be given to the mIes that determine these frontiers; they may be called natural rights, or the word of God, or naturallaw, or the demands of utility or of the 'permanent interests of man'; 1 may believe them to be valid a priori, or assert them to be my own ultimate ends, or the ends of my society or culture. What these mIes or commandments will have in common is that they are accepted so widely, and are grounded so deeply in the actual nature of men as we have developed through history, as to be, by now, as essential part ofwhat we mean by human beings. Genuine belief in the inviolability of a minimum extent of individualliberty entails sorne such absolute stand. 149 While this passage is frequently taken as an assertion of Berlin' s own position, careful examination of the text reveals that it is rather a position he is attributing to "nineteenth century liberal thinkers," who he is setting up in contrast to those who, "at the opposite pole" have argued for liberty in the positive sense. His own purpose here, as he puts it elsewhere, is not to take sides, but to draw attention to the fact of ultimate
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competition. 150 The conclusion to the penultimate section ofhis essay makes this intention clear: despite a common source, positive and negative liberty as they have evolved ultimately do reflect ... two profoundly divergent and irreconcilable attitudes to the ends of life. It is as well to recognize this, even if it is in practice often necessary to strike a compromise between them. For each ofthem makes absolute claims. They cannot both be fully satisfied. But if is a profound lack ofsocial and moral understanding not to recognize that the satisfaction that both ofthem seeks is an ultimate value which, both historical/y and moral/y, has an equal right to be classed among the deepest interests ofmankind. 151 Rather than propounding an absolute commitment to negative liberty, or a minimum thereof, on his own behalf, he is characterizing one of two equally legitimate but rivalrous conceptions of liberty with the purpose of illustrating the persuasiveness of a pluralist interpretation of the range of ultimate values. What is all the more striking about this argument is that he is not concemed simply with two competing distinct ultimate values, but with two legitimate ultimate ends arising out of the same value. This brings us to probably the most widely cited passage supporting the idea of a special privilege or insulation for negative liberty. It is also the specifie passage Berlin refers to in the quotation at the end of the first section ofthis chapter, where he protests that he has been misunderstood as defending negative liberty when in fact his intention is to defend pluralism. The adjusted passage reads as follows: Pluralism, with the measure of 'negative' liberty that it entails, seems to me a truer and more humane ideal than the goals of those who see in the great, disciplined, authoritarian structures the ideal of 'positive' self-mastery by classes, or peoples, or the whole ofmankind. To assume that all values can be graded on one scale, so that it is a mere matter of inspection to determine the highest, seems to me to falsify our knowledge that men are free agents, to represent moral decision as an operation which a slide-rule could, in principle, perform. 152 The first point which should be remarked in this passage is that Berlin refers to pluralism here, as elsewhere, as an ideal, and thence as a normative value and not as a definitive descriptive account of our condition. Moreover, what is being compared with this normative pluralist ideal not positive liberty per se, but certain variants of positive liberty characterized (a.) as 'great disciplined, authoritarian structures,' with the implication of grounding in closed and 'ruthless' monisms; (b.) as focused on the ideal of self-mastery,

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and hence on internaI obstacles to freedom (and hence implying a hierarchy of the self); and (c.) as linked with 'classes, or peoples, or the whole ofmankind' (and hence vested in some 'super-personal' entity). By comparison to these authoritarian formulations of positive liberty, the ideal of pluralism, on Berlin's construction, does indeed extend to negative liberty a recognition as an ultimate human value which affords it 'a measure' of protection absent in the alternative ideal. Indeed, pluralism embraces a range of ultimate values which are unlikely to be recognized on the peculiar authoritarian monisms he has in mind. His emphasis on negative liberty is explicable in terms of the subject ofthis particular essay, that is, two essential but distinct forms of liberty, and his historical argument that positive liberty has been a particularly frequent victim of such forms of monism. Pluralism is far less likely to rely exclusively on one concept of liberty or the other. In this sense, Berlin argues that pluralism is a more humane ideal than monism, worthy of recognition and protection. It is instructive to note that Berlin does not simply assert that pluralism is objectively true, or normatively superior in every respect to even the problematic construction of positive liberty dominated by ruthless monism with which he contrasts it in this passage. The passage does then seem, as Berlin maintains in his clarification, to offer an interpretive, argumentative defense of pluralism against ruthless monism, and not a 'blanket endorsement ofnegative liberty.' Negative liberty is treated as a component within pluralism rather than a constraint on it. The alteration of the passage to which Berlin refers in his clarification is from 'negative liberty' to 'Pluralism, with the measure ofnegative liberty it entails.' 153 It appears then that it is precisely an overemphasis on negative liberty outside or prior to pluralism which "would itself constitute precisely the kind of intolerant monism against which the entire argument is directed." This hostility to intolerant monism would also, incidentally, encompass a blanket endorsement of the ideal of self-creation as suggested by Gray. The shift to pluralism with a measure of negative liberty, however, does not cntircly solve the problem, however, for although it may be as little as the basic core that negative liberty shares with its positive 'twin brother,' the entailment can still be read, however contrary to Berlin's intention, as implying a substantial and absolute minimum, and indeed has often continued to be. This is a claim not merely framed in terms of greater truth and humanity in comparison with certain ruthless and authoritarian forms of

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positive liberty, but in general, against aIl contrary claims. In particular, it can still be connected back with the minimum threshold demanded by negative liberty. This brings the discussion back around to the matter of the minimal threshold of demanded by negative liberty to avoid inhumanity and dehumanization. Already we have seen that this minimum is not to be construed as 'absolute' or 'inviolable', so that even this linkage does not seem to warrant any absolute elevation of a core of negative liberty, or any constraint on the range ofpluralism. Still, it may be objected that the limitations on this type of minimum demand of negative liberty are not such as to fully assimilate back within the general free play ofultimate values, and at least in one respect
1 think this is at least partially accurate.

Berlin does explicitly allow for deep violations of negative liberty under certain abnormal circumstances:
It [the minimum threshold ofnegative liberty] is not inviolable, because abnormal conditions may occur, in which even the sacred frontiers of which Constant speaks, e.g., those violated by retrospective laws, punishment of the innocent, judicial murder, information laid against parents by children, the bearing of faise witness, may have to be disregarded if sorne sufficiently terrible alternative is to 154 be averted.

... say, to save men from murder or starvation or injustice or degradation, or to prevent sorne other disastrous frustration ofbasic human needs. 155 [ia] This listing ofpotential violations seems to run to the very core of Berlin's idea of negative liberty. There can be nothing untouchable in that "area within which a man can act unobstructed by others" if the punishment of innocents, judicial murder, and the bearing offalse witness are to be, under certain circumstances, condoned by society. The critical question is what can warrant such violation? Berlin refers to abnormal conditions - which could be almost anything - and later, averting terrible alternatives. This indicates that there are circumstances which could potentially weigh equally or even more heavily in particular cases even than such egregious violations of the core of negative liberty. Berlin affirms below that such measures are to be condoned only when faced with a choice "between great evils,,156 but leaves open at this juncture what could qualify as evils of sufficient magnitude. At the end of "Two Concepts of Liberty," however, he seems to suggest two general classes of choices, the first ofwhich

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at least only partially re-integrates minimum negative liberty into the clash ofultimate values. In the first case, he writes To preserve our absolute categories or ideals at the expense ofhuman lives offends equally against the principles of science and history; it is an attitude found in equal measure on the right and left wings in our days, and is not reconcilable with the principles accepted by those who respect the facts. 157 Thus, the principle of the preservation ofhuman lives, grounded it might be said somewhat obscurely on principles and facts of science and history, may warrant the violation of even the most minimal demands of the principle of negative liberty. In-sofar as this provision would raise only one contrary principle - the preservation of human lives - into legitimate contestation with the minimum demands of negative liberty, it might be legitimately said to constitute an only partial re-assimilation of this minimum within the bounds of plural contestation of ultimate values, and might be argued, not without merit, to be more properly understood as a sort exception clause. This formulation of "great evils," or at least one sort of great evil, would seem to warrant sorne case for a special status for the minimum core of negative liberty. On the other hand, the idea that the preservation of human lives could warrant judicial murder, for example, seems to involve a rather problematic calculus ofhuman lives. In the second passage above on permissible infringements, Berlin again refers to avoiding starvation or murder as a potential warrant for violating minimal thresholds, but goes on to also include avoiding injustice, and other frustrations of basic human needs. Towards the end of "Two Concepts of Liberty," Berlin also insists again, more illuminatingly perhaps, that "respect for the principles ofjustice, or shame at gross inequality oftreatment, is as basic in men as the desire for liberty.,,158 Equally, he has insisted that positive liberty 'is a fundamental human need,' 'essential to a decent existence.' In other words, although they are not the subject ofhis essay, there are minimum requirements ofjustice and equality, as there are of positive liberty, as ultimate human values, that are as essential to avoiding dehumanization and inhumanity as the minimum threshold of negative liberty, and can potentially warrant its invasion. These competing principles at their cores then are deemed of comparable weight with the minimum of negative liberty, and their violation, singly or in combination, could constitute "great evils" of sufficient magnitude to potentially warrant incursions into the
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minimum of negative liberty in particular cases. Indeed, the very cases that Berlin has in mind, such as 'punishment of innocents,' 'judicial murder,' or 'bearing false witness' already seem to infringe minimal standards of the principles ofjustice rather than those of negative liberty proper. This principle of minimal thresholds extends to other ultimate values as well, including positive liberty, although in this latter case, since self-realization could take any number of forms, it may be bootless to talk of a specifie substantial minimum "area" of positive liberty. Such "intolerable choices," or tragic clashes between ultimate values, are a possibility to which Berlin is anxious to sensitize his readers, in order that they may be, where possible, avoided. They may be rare, but despite vigilance they may occur, and then "we must decide as we decide;" "The right policy cannot be arrived at in a mechanical or deductive fashion; there are no hard-andfast rules to guide US.,,159 This second consideration then fully re-integrates the minimum demands of negative liberty into the pluralist contestation of ultimate values, in a fashion fully consistent with Berlin's avowed intention of defending an ideal ofpluralism as opposed to any absolute standard ofnegative liberty. On the other hand, it also provides a full warrant to his argument that pluralism extends a very significant protection to negative liberty, and especially its minimum demands, as well as to a range of other ultimate human values, certainly far more than do the ruthless monisms he is concerned to criticize, and therefore provides the necessary force to his argument that by comparison it entails a measure of negative liberty. It is, moreover, fully consistent with his characterization of a range of values as equally ultimate, with the impossibility of establishing principles governing their interaction in advance, with his focus on the individual case, and above all with his rejection of any demonstrable overriding principles, and finallywith his emphasis on the general possibility oftragic conflict among ultimate values. It is, moreover, consonant with his moderate but consistent
historiciSl11 (and his gcneral repudiation of certainty or objective answers to normative

questions), and, as we will see, his pluralist liberalism.

4.iv Conclusion
This chapter was devoted primarily to criticism of liberal interpretations of Berlin as seeking to establish either a general or a core priority for negative liberty as a break or

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limitation on his idea ofpluralism, and to the general exposition of Berlin's treatment of pluralism and liberty. It was found that Berlin' s development of pluralism as defining a plurality of equally ultimate human values not structured hierarchically was broadly inconducive to any presumptive priority for liberty in general, or for negative liberty in particular. Moreover, Berlin's exploration ofliberty as a divided concept neither eventuated ultimately in any rigid internai hierarchy favoring negative over positive liberty, or for liberty in relation to other values. Berlin offered a historical argument warning against excessive reliance on positive liberty without the constraints implied by a simultaneous respect for negative liberty. The chapter also questioned the contention of the main pluralist interpretations of Berlin that he was not self-consciously a strong pluralist. Berlin advocated, deliberately and repeatedly, a 100 se and uneasy equilibrium of positive and negative liberty both internally with each other, and externally with other, competing ultimate human values. This is also a strongly historicist view in its emphasis on particular contexts and particular cases. Berlin seemed to advocate this basic position fairly consistently throughout his papers, so that the evidence militated against Mack's suggestion that at sorne point he made a shift from a deontological position to a more thoroughly romantic one. Moreover, Crowder's suggestion that Berlin saw values in general as demanding equal respect seemed to comport badly with Berlin's recognition of a limited (although open-ended) range of equally ultimate values, as did Gray's insistence on a supreme value of self-creation of which negative and positive liberty were merely conditions. In essence, l contend that Berlin's thought does not suggest a simple and direct privilege for negative liberty. Neither did negative liberty enjoy a general priority over positive liberty, nor did liberty in general enjoy a special role vis a vis other values. If Berlin is read in this way, much of the concern with the underdevelopment ofhis thought is dissipated. In the first place, Berlin's unwillingness to specify the limits ofpluralism in tcrms of a substantial account of negative liberty is only natural, since negative liberty is part of, not a break on, pluralism. More generally, ifultimate values are effectively equal, and 'no overarching principle can be enunciated' in advance to govern their conflicts because they depend on the particularities of specific cases, then it is not only unnecessary but impossible to lay out a comprehensive general structure of the

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interrelation of values. Finally, since, as Berlin suggests, the full significance of values will be radically different and contested among diverse legitimate basic models, his point is not to determine their full significance but their common recognizability and the basic sense or kernel which is common to alliegitimate formulations. Such commonly recognizable ultimate values, and particularly their basic kernels are of necessity general and rather vague. Berlin tries to show how these basic kernels can be and are elaborated in diverse but reasonable ways which can conflict, sometimes incommensurably and incompatibly. This insight is adequate to sustain his argument for pluralism. Again, his restraint does not reflect underdevelopment but a necessary manifestation ofhis strong pluralism. The critical point here is that what appears from Ignatieff or Galipeau's liberal perspectives as underdevelopment is not a product, as they seem to suggest, of neglect or oversight or failure on Berlin's part. It only appears this way from the perspective of a very direct defense of liberalism through negative liberty. Once it is allowed that Berlin's primary purpose is to articulate an insight into the plurality ofrecognizable values, then his restraint is understandable as a necessary concomitant of his argument. Moreover, it can then be appreciated why his restraint or modesty does not undermine the strength of his argument, but underlines it. On the other hand, contrary to his pluralist interpreters, l will argue that Berlin's particular variant of strong pluralism is conducive to, but does not strictly determine, his pluralist liberalism, but that argument must await chapter 6. For the moment l want to turn in the next chapter to drawing the moderate historicist and strong pluralist readings together more closely through Berlin's understanding ofhuman nature, and to show that this reading has adequate backbone to resist sorne of its most important contemporary critics.

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Notes Berlin, "Marxism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Sense ofReality, p. 121. 2 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 368. 3 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 22. 4 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 2. 5 John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. xi; also John Kekes, "The Incompatibility of Liberalism and Pluralism," American Philosophical Quarterly, Volume 29, Number 2 (April 1992), p. 144 and p. 148. 6 Erick Mack, "Isaiah Berlin and the Quest for Liberal Pluralism," p. 227. 7 George Crowder, "Pluralism and Liberalism," Political Studies, Volume XLII, (1994), p.297. 8 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 242. 9 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlix - 1. 10 Isaiah Berlin, Four Essays and Liberty, p. 1. 11 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 92. 12 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lviiifn. 12 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lviiin. 13 Isaiah Berlin, "Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 553. 14 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 240 - 2; for Berlin's own characterization ofthis 'polemic' against monism see Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lviiin. (Berlin writes, "the enemy of pluralism is monism," Isaiah Berlin, "My Intellectual Path," in The Power of Ideas, p. 14.) 15 Isaiah Berlin, "Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 555. 16 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 14. 17 A good pluralist discussion of Plato and Aristotle as monists can be found in John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism, p. 63 - 6.
1 Isaiah

Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 136 - 7; Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 238; Isaiah Berlin, "The Counter-Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 255; Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in Eighteenth Century Thought," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 71; also see, Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 69; Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241; there is a good summary of much of this on Isaiah Berlin, "Joseph de Maistre and the Origins of Fascism," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 106 - 8. See also Ramin Jahanbegloo (eci.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 75; and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays in Liberty, p. 1. 19 Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 52. 20 Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, 72.
18

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21 Isaiah Berlin, "Giambattista Vico and Cultural History," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 73; quoted, with good discussion in Stephen Lukes, "An Unfashionable Fox," in Mark Lilla, Ronald Dworkin and Robert Silvers, The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 47. 22 Isaiah Berlin, "Logical Translation," "Verification," "Empirical Propositions and Hypothetical Statements," in Isaiah Berlin, Concepts and Categories. For a summary see Isaiah Berlin, "My Intellectual Path," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 1 - 4. 23 Based on a good discussion ofmonism in John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 71 - 5. 24 Although the idea of constructing of developing a program of human studies at least paralle1 to the natural sciences would be revived later in the century, as indicated in the Introduction. 25 Isaiah Berlin, "Nationalism: Past Neglect and Present Power," and "Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," p. 580 in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 592 - 3; Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 28 - 30; Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 177; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Philosophy and Government Repression," in The Sense of Reality, p. 69 and p. 72 - 3. 26 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 68. 27 Isaiah Berlin, "Euopean Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 178 - 9. 28 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 24. 29 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," Four Essays on Liberty, p. 30. 30 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," Four Essays on Liberty, p. 27. 31 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," Four Essays on Liberty, p. 29 - 30. 32 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," Four Essays on Liberty, p. 39. 33 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Pursuit ofthe Ideal, p. 9. 34 1 include many quotes to this effect in the chapter, but one which 1 don't include is Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in Eighteenth Century Thought," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 87. 35 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 8. 36 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. Il; see also, Isaiah Berlin "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p.

322. 37 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 320. 38 Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 311 - 2 and p. 313. 39 Isaiah Berlin, "The Decline ofUtopian Ideas in the West," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 32.

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40 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and The Enlightenment," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 368. Here Berlin is describing a Herderian conception of which he approves. Eisewhere, in "The Pursuit of the Ideal," for example, he defines pluralism as follows: "what 1 should describe as pluralism - that is, the conception that there are many different ends that men may seek and still be fully rational, fully men, capable of understanding each other and sympathizing and deriving light from each other. .. " The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 9. 41 Indeed, this point seems to the central thrust of Berlin's early philosophical papers, such as Isaiah Berlin, "Verification," in Concepts and Categories, p. 27 - 31; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Empirical Statements and Hypothetical Propositions," in Concepts and Categories, p. 32 - 3 and 51 - 5; and especially "Logical Translation," in Concepts and Categories, p. 56 - 9 and p. 79 - 80. 42 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 53. 43 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 50. 44 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 242. This distinction is developed and explained very effectively in Michael Sandel, Liberalism and the Limits ofJustice, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), p. 56. 45 This distinction is developed and explained very effectively in Michael Sandel, Liberalism and the Limits ofJustice, p. 56. Berlin does not, 1 would like to emphasize, explicitly develop the linkage of values with identity - "as constitutive of identity" - in any great detail. He does, however, refer such a connection in a number of passages, and writes of objective values in a number of ways which indicate this sort of connection. In the first place, he emphasizes how ultimate, objective values are 'pursued by different societies at various times, or by different groups in the same society, by entire classes or churches or races, or by particular individuals within them," (lsaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 80). Second, he emphasizes that such values must be in the highest echelon in the strata of values. (Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390). Third, he writes of such values as being integral to concepts ofhuman nature, and therefore as impossible to abrogate without feeling that one has behaved inhumanely, without having betrayed one's nature. (Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity," p. 200 and p. 204 - 5). Finally, he writes of such values as being primary - as extending beyond simple matters of taste or preference. ("European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 204 - 5) This treatment, 1 suggest, is weIl expressed in the idea that such values are constitutive for us, are bound up with our particular identities. 46 Berlin very explicitly rejects the realist view in relation to values that Gray attributes to him in Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 100. 47 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 8 - 9. 48 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 38. 49 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 10. 50 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 11. 51 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 10. 52 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 65. 53 Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 81.

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Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 82. is one value among many: "the degree to which it is compatible with other ends depends on the concrete situation, and cannot be deduced from generallaws of any kind ...." (Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 90.) 56 Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 100. 57 Isaiah Berlin, "Equality," Concepts and Categories, p. 102. 58 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15. 59 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Libealism: A Reply," Political Studies, Volume XLI (1993), p. 306 - 307. 60 The recognition that loyalty may sometimes outweigh justice is reflected, for example, in the legal privilege of not testifying against a spouse. 61 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 307; Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 14. 62 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15. 63 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 307. 64 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 306. 65 Isaiah Berlin, "The Decline ofUtopian Ideas in the West," The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 32. 66 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241. 67 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMan kind, p. 320. 68 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 14. 69 John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism, p. 27, 32 - 4. 70 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 307. 71 We might think here, for example, of the values laid out in the preamble to the American constitution: a more perfect union, justice, domestic tranquility, the cornmon defense, general welfare, and the blessings ofliberty for ourselves and our posterity. 72 Michael Ignatieff gives a nice expression of the potential clash of core Western values in Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 228. 73 Quoted approvingly in Martha Nussbaum, The Fragility ofGoodness (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), p. 20. 74 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241. 75 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 240. 76 Quoted in C.J. Galipeau, p. 115. 77 Bernard Williams, "Introduction," in Isaiah Berlin, Concepts and Categories, p. xviii. 78 Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," p. 176 - 8, and p. 181 - 5; Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 6 and 12. 79 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 35. 80 Isaiah Berlin, "Marxism and the International in the Nineteenth Century," in The Sense ofReality, p. 121. 81 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 64 - 66, 86 - 90; also see "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 191; also see Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," in Concepts and Categories, p. 10-11. 82 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 241 - 2 in The Proper Study ofMankind; and Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind,
54 55 Equality
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g.10-1,andp.14-6. 3 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. liii - liv. 84 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 14. 85 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxvii; Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 391; also see Berlin as quoted on C.J. Galipeau, p. 86n; and Athaneum Interview, p. 1 - 3. 86 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxi. 87 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 10; Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 317; see also Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 240 - 1; Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvi. 88 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvi. 89 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 10. 90 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 240. 91 See, for example: Hamann: Isaiah Berlin, J G. Hamann and Origins ofModern Irrationalism, p. 47 - 53; Hamann believed in utter submission to the will ofGod (although this, as in later cases, must be sharply distinguished from opposition to free will per se); Marxm "Marxism and the International in the Nineteenth Century," in The Sense ofReality, p. 128 - 9; Maistre: his attitude to individualliberty is well represented in Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lixn; Isaiah Berlin, "The Counter-Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 266 also see Isaiah Berlin, "Joseph de Maistre and the Origins of Fascism," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 105 - 6, 108, 122, 125, and especially p. 115 and p. 118 - 9 and p. 160. In this essay Berlin particularly emphasizes Bonald as another great opponent of individualliberty (p. 100). 92 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 193 4 and p. 202 - 4, also see "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliii. 93 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxviii. 94 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlv. 95 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 29, for example. 96 See particularly, Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvi -iviii. 97 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 219fn. 98 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xl. 99 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lviii. It is this sense in which liberty is an end in itselfthat leads him to reject Mccallum's tipartite division of freedom - G.c. MacCallum, "Negative and Positive Liberty, in P. Laslett, W.G. Runciman, and Q. Skinner (ed.s), Philosophy, Politics and Society (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1972) and Joel Feinberg's four way division - Joel Feinberg, Social Philosophy (Eaglewood Cliffs. NJ: Prentice Hall, 1973). Both divisions require freedom, positive or negative, to be pursued to a further purpose, while Berlin insists that as an end-in-itself, it can be pursued for its own sake. \00 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. liii. 101 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 26 - 9. \02 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxi. \03 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxi. \04 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lx.
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Isaiah Berlin and C.l. Galipeau, "All Souls Interview," p. 32 - 6. Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 194 and 202 - 4 and "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliii. \07 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 203. 108 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvi. 109 Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 113. 110 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 203. III Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Freedom, p. xliii. 112 lder for example, Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 203. 113 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliv. 114 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lx. Ils Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free,,, in The Proper Study ofMan kind, p. 109 - 111. 116 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 203 4, and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliv. 117 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMan kind, p. 206 and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Freedom, p. xliv. 118 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 203 6. 119 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 205. 120 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p.xxxiv. 121 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 233. 122 This argument is made forcefully by Peter Woolcock, "Hunt and Berlin on Positive and Negative Freedom," Australian Journal ofPhilosophy, Volume 73, Number 3 (September 1995), p. 458 - 464: Woolcock condudes "positive freedom can be misused to limit a person's negative liberty, but only where it is the internaI positive freedom of a non-manifest self that sorne other person daims to properly represent. When positive freedom has not been arrogated by another in this way, then it is just as important a part of the overall freedom of the individual as is negative freedom." (p. 464) 123 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 233. 124 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 228. 125 Immanuel Kant, The Critique ofPractical Reason, translated by T.K. Abott (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1996), p. 48. 126 Isaiah Berlin, "A Reply to David West," p. 297. 127 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 239. 128 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 237. 129 Isaiah Berlin, , "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlvii. 130 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvi. 131 Ramin lahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lsaiah Berlin, p. 41. 131 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. il - 1. 132 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 52 - 134. 133 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in FourEssays on Liberty, p. lviii. 134 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. Iv. 135 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxi.
105 106

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Isaiah Berlin, , "Introduction," in Four Essay; on Liberty, p. xliv. Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlv. 138 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 201 - 2. 139 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlv - xlvi. 140 Isaiah Berin, ""Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlv. 141 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 234. 142 Isaiah Berlin, , "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlv. 143 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction" in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxviii. 144 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 202n. 145 Sorne highly perceptive critics, notably my supervisor, argue that Berlin does not regard the problem of the potential suppression of desires as a problem ofnegative liberty per se, but only with certain traditional ways offraming negative liberty, such as Mill's. Berlin criticizes these understandings and reformulates the concept to correct this deficiency. There is admittedly sorne important textual support for this reading, most significantly 1think Berlin's remarks in the "Introduction" to Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxxviii - xl. 1 do not want to deny or dismiss the force of this argument, but it raises a number of involved questions. It deserves a more careful and detailed answer than 1 can give it here. However, 1 do not think that it need be in any way decisive in relation to the argument 1 am making for Berlin's championing of an uneasy equilibrium. It would not, even taken at face value, vindicaate negative liberty from the other criticisms Berlin does c1early raise. Moreover, 1think it is fairly c1ear that Berlin does not fully resolve this difficulty with his reformulation. Whether or not he believes that he does is admittedly a more ambiguous question, but 1 am inc1ined to believe that he does not. For the moment, 1 simply offer two general points. First, there is a strong case to be made that Berlin does not succeed in resolving the desires problem. An effective articulation of this case is offered in Richard J. Arneson, "Freedom and Desire," Canadian Journal ofPhilosophy, Volume 15, Number 3 (1985), see summaries on p. 431 and p. 446 - 8. This case, if persuasive, is enough to show that the problem of desires still plagues negative liberty. Even if persuasive, however, this argument does not prove that Berlin did not believe that he had solved the problem with his reformulation. On this latter point, 1 simply point on the one hand to the crude, interpretive, and even impressionistic, account insusceptible of integration according to any objective measure Berlin offers of negative liberty in the revised text of "Two Concepts of Liberty," (The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 202n), with its appeal to the openness of possibilities regarded as important within my frame of life, and suggest that this provides a strong basis on which to argue that while may have believed he had diminished the problem of desires, he understood very well that he had not eradicated it entirely - the question of what, for example, is an is not an important path for me remains deeply bound up with my own goals and desires. It is, among other things, this important element of subjectivity in the assessment of the degree of liberty which renders it impressionistic. 1 suggest that by introducing sorne more objective elements into his definition ofliberty, Berlin fends off the possibility of total manipulation through acculturation, but that he does nonetheless recognize that subjective desires remain central to the degree ofliberty, and hence the manipulation of desires remains a significant problem. 146 Isaiah Berlin, , "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lvii.
136 137

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Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlvi. Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 41. 149 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 236. 150 Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "AH Souls Interview," p. 14 - 5; Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliv -Iii; Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 40 - 3. 151 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 237. 152 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241. 153 The precise passage in the original reads, "The 'negative' liberty that they strive to realize seems to me a truer and more humane ideal that the goals of those who seek in the great, disciplined, authoritarian, structures the ideal of 'positive' self-mastery by classes, or peoples, or the whole ofmankind." (Isaiah Berlin, Two Concepts ofLiberty (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1958), p. 56). It is worth noting that here again Berlin emphasizes that the positive comparison is specificaHy with what he sees as the dangerous possibilities of positive liberty. 154 Isaiah Berlin, "Introuduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lx. 155 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 391. 156 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lxi. 157 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241. 158 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 240. 159 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. Iv.
147 148

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It may be that the ideal of freedom to choose ends without claiming eternal

validity for them, and the pluralism of values connected with this, is only the late fruit of our declining capitalist civilization: an ideal which remote ages and primitive societies have not recognized, and one which posterity will regard with curiosity, even sympathy, but with little comprehension. This may be so; but no skeptical conclusion seems to me to follow. Principles are not less sacred because their duration cannot be guaranteed. Indeed, the very desire for guarantees that our values are eternal and secure in some objective heaven is perhaps only a craving for the certainties of our primitive past. 'To realize the relative validity of one's own convictions' said an admirable writer of our time, 'and yet to stand for them unflinchingly is what distinguishes a civilized man from a barbarian.' To demand more than this is perhaps a deep and incurable metaphysical need; but to allow it to determine one's practice is a symptom of an equally deep, and more dangerous, moral and political immaturity.\ - Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty" We are doomed to choose, and every choice may entail an irreparable 10ss.2 - Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal"

Chapter 5: Ruman Nature and the Unstable Political Equilibrium 5.i The Problems of Integration and Defense
Chapter 3 presented and defended a moderate historicist understanding of Berlin's basic approach to history and philosophy, including his moral and political thought. This approach involved a recognition of diverse historical periods and cultures as unique forms of life with their own objective systems of value and their own experiences and understandings of human nature, fully intelligible only in light ofthese distinctive characteristics. On Berlin's account, the forms oflife were also frequently characterized by a profound internaI diversity which also posed important obstacles to understanding. These obstacles can be characterized as external and internaI pluralism, and in both cases Berlin made a case for at least partial and interpretive understanding through the exercise of reconstuctive sympathetic imagination grounded firmly in empirical evidence. This interpretation told against naturalist and a priori readings of Berlin as weIl as those attributing to him claims of moral certainty. Chapter 4 explored Berlin' s moral and political thought, and in particular his understanding of pluralism and liberty, and his central commitment to an unstable equilibrium of equally ultimate values in public life. What the last chapter did not focus on was how moderate historicism might be thought to work to support Berlin's political views as presented in Chapter 4. This chapter focuses

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on drawing out and defending that connection. In examining this connection, it attempts to address sorne of the concerns that have been raised by critics as to the underdetermination of Berlin's political thought. The idea that Berlin's philosophical and political thought might draw on a historicist foundation has been questioned by sorne of Berlin' s most rigorous interpreters. Even Gray, who at least points in the direction of a kind ofhistoricist interpretation of Berlin (although admittedly of a more radical type), muses "Perhaps this tension [occassioned by the universalist and historicist elements in his thought] is ineliminable. Or, ifit can be eliminated, it may be at a price Berlin was reluctant to pay .... ,,3 In Gray's estimate, the price indudes a profound re-interpretation of Berlin's views which seemingly leaves several of Berlin's key themes unsupported and largely cuts off its support of liberalism. While Galipeau too recognizes an important historicist element in Berlin's philosophical and political thought, he makes an even stronger daim than Gray. He suggests that it is a naturalist component in Berlin's thought which is his "touchstone," and which "stops his doctrine of moral pluralism from slipping into relativism and nihilism.,,4 The suggestion here is that a consistently historicist reading would lack the necessary backbone to sustain Berlin's political commitments, and would be deprived ofthe argumentative resources required to sustain its attack on monism as well as to contest the daims of other political theories. Galipeau suggests that a consistently historicist reading collapses into a shapeless nihilism and relativism. This chapter focuses on assessing the argumentative strength of Berlin's political thought seen as drawing on a historicist interpretation of human nature within the contemporary form oflife. The central issue can be thus phrased: 'can a moderate historicist approach to the self-understanding of the modern Western form of life provide reasonable, even compelling, support for Berlin's political model of a 100 se and agitated equilibrium of equally ultimate values in public life?' Can his work, thus interpreted,
stand up to critical challenges? l have three such challenges in mind in particular.

The first challenge has already been posed by Galipeau. The question is whether Berlin's work, read in terms of a consistently moderate historicist approach, does slip into relativism and nihilism. Norman Podhoretz provides a good example of a critic who makes a case that strict universals are absent in Berlin's work and that the consequence is

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much as Galipeau suggested: Podhoretz argues that Berlin's work suffers from " ... the spinelessness that can develop from the rejection of any absolutes and the correlative failure to develop rock-bottom convictions."s By consequence, Podhoretz concludes " ... for the life of me, 1 cannot perceive any solid logical or philosophical ground in his work for exonerating him from the charge ofrelativism."6 A second key critical issue concerns Berlin's ability to sustain his critique of monism on a moderate historicist basis. A version of this issue was raised but not substantially addressed in the last chapter - specifically, does Berlin's thought, understood on a moderate historicist basis, have the critical resources to resist sophisticated contemporary defenders ofmonism? Ronald Dworkin's recent critique of Berlin will provide a useful case study of this question. Dworkin offers a highly articulate elaboration of a monist position of precisely a type, as he himself observes, that Berlin most vociferously condemned. 7 Dworkin has recently sought to advance his position through a critique of pluralism, and of Berlin in particular; he writes, Berlin said that value conflicts he described were all about us, and evident to all except the immature. 1 do not think that he sustained that very broad claim; indeed, as 1 have just argued, 1 do not think that he maintained it even in the case he took as his paradigm: the supposed conflict between liberty and equality.8 Can a moderate historicist reading of Berlin resist Dworkin's potent monist rejoinder? A final criticalline cornes at Berlin from a different angle. It suggests that Berlin's thought and pluralism was still not contextual enough. Critics like Charles Blattberg have charged that pluralists, including Berlin, rely on "isolable, self-contained and independently distinct" and most importantly "decontextualized" accounts of values which provide an impoverished account of moral and political discourse in comparison with the alternatives offered by hermeneuticists, or sometimes patriots. 9 Blattberg argues that pluralist accounts of value unnecessarily constrain politics as discourse by dictating the framcwork of dialogue in advance. The issue Blattberg raises then is whether a moderate historicist account can give a defensible contextual expression to isolable values, or more precisely to what Blattberg writes of as value shells. Together, these three issues provide the basis for a general assessment of the essential viability of Berlin's position on a moderate historicist reading. The baseline

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necessity for Berlin's thought is to show that his central idea of an agitated pluralistic equilibrium ofultimate values is at least reasonable or plausible under fire, and hence worthy of serious consideration in moral and political thought. Of course, Berlin aspires to persuade, but his own pluralism suggests that there are serious limits to how far one can expect to persuade everyone all the time. The following chapter is divided into two general sections. The first lays out how 1think that Berlin's moderate historicism can be understood to contribute to the plausibility ofhis interpretation of contemporary moral and politicallife as exhibiting a strong but contoured pluralism. The second section encounters the three critical challenges introduced above in the following order: Cl) the monist rejoinder; (2) the hermeneutic challenge; and (3) the relativist challenge. The main thesis of the chapter can be summarized in the claim that moderate historicism provides a flexible but cohesive basis for Berlin's political commitments, adequate to resist some of the most important and trenchant criticisms which have been brought against il. In other words, Berlin's political commitments are adequately determined.
S.ii The Content of Historicized Human Nature

This section offers an overview of the link between Berlin' s moderate historicism and his political thought through his historicized view of human nature and basic model of moral and politicallife. Section 5.iii then outlines in more detail how Berlin argues his position for a strong pluralist public life, without appealing to strict moral universals or definite moral knowledge - that is, on a moderate historicist account - and shows how this approach helps to link together the many diverse themes ofhis published work. My suggestion is not that Berlin's writing followed an elaborate premeditated plan, but rather that whatever work he did always returned to, and enriched, his essential pluralist insighl. How then does the moderate historicist interpretation of Berlin' s work help us to understand Berlin's political thought? In essence, the moderate historicist interpretation of Berlin's work relieves it of the onerous burden of claims to moral certainty and literai universality that are frequently attributed to it and diversifies its sources of support beyond the abstract conceptual analysis which is frequently given exclusive emphasis by opening up the possibility of drawing on his history of ideas, his biography and even his aesthetic writings as well as his analysis of particular philosophical problems as bases for

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understanding the contemporary Western forrn of life. These sources together support Berlin's interpretation ofhistoricized human nature and his basic pluralist model of modem Western moral and politicallife.

In the first place then, the moderate historicist reading suggests that the primary
purposes of Berlin's historical and philosophical thought converge on the development of an interpretive understanding of the background of moral and politicallife and concepts of human nature in the contemporary forrn of life. Berlin' s historical thought focuses primarily on the interpretive understanding of diverse forrns of life through sympathetic imaginative reconstruction tethered to empirical evidence. Patterns of change, institutions, language, art, ideas, are aU important elements in this understanding. The purpose of such historical inquiry was not merely to better understand diverse periods and cultures, but primarily to produce a clearer reflective self-understanding. On the other hand, Berlin's philosophy and political thought were understood in Chapter 3 as a form of moderate historicism turned inwards, proceeding through the exposure, understanding and critique of the background basic models of moral and politicallife and underlying concepts of human nature prevailing in a given culture or

language in a given country at a particular time, in his own case, "the main political
doctrines of the West." However, these doctrines "(and this is conspicuously true of politics) ... have not stood still: sorne of the notions ofwhich they are compounded are no longer recognized."IO Berlin is primarily concerned with identifying what notions are recognizable to us now and consequently which constitute the objective system of values of the contemporary forrn of life. The principal purpose of both historical inquiry and political philosophy was what Berlin caUs man's "highest caUing," 'greater selfunderstanding,' II so that we can understand the roots and sources of our own beliefs and do not "act wildly in the dark.,,12 The primary objectives ofboth Berlin's historical and philosophical thought then converge in the common aspiration to interpretive understanding of the background basic models and concepts of human nature which characterize our own forrn of life. For Berlin, self-understanding begins with bringing to light the dominant models and characteristic values of one' s own particular period both through historical reconstruction and the exploration of the particular philosophical problems which prove

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persistently troubling. In this pursuit, the moderate historicist reading draws attention to Berlin's notion of objective systems of values as those potentially recognizable by everyone or virtually everyone by a 'sufficient effort of imagination,' and to the fact that Berlin seems to apply this notion to individual forms of life, each "objectively valid in its own day.,,13 Self-understanding then involves interpreting the objective structure of values within a form of life. This interpretive self-understanding corresponds to what Berlin described as the first step in doing philosophy in general and political thought in particular - that is, to draw out the often imperceptible basic models of moral and politicallife with their underlying concepts of human nature. This descriptive interpretation reveals that sorne of these conceptions of human nature and attendant basic models of moral and political values are oid and well-established, such as Christianity or Platonism, although often now appearing in new forms, while others are of comparatively recent vintage, such as liberalism, romanticism or historicism. As Berlin puts it, "the models of Plato, or of Aristotle, or of Judaism, Christianity, Kantian liberalism, romanticism, historicism all survive and contend with each other today in a variety of guises.,,14 Similarly, there are sorne relatively ancient values with long and established pedigrees across diverse periods and cultures which enter into the contemporary form of life, such as happiness and community, and others which are relatively new, such as tolerance, equality, sincerity, pluralism, and negative liberty.15 Berlin defines these values as ultimate ends-inthemselves which flow from plausible and recognizable basic models and are commonly recognizable within our form of life. 16 He grants that differences of basic models and concepts of human nature will result in significantly different interpretations of these values, but insists that there remains an essential kernel which is basic, and certain common uses or extensions which are broadly recognizable. 17 Together these recognizable values form what Berlin terms "a public world of common values.,,18 The second step of Berlin's approach to political thought is to critique, compare and contrast the diverse basic models and concepts of human nature, and, to offer an alternative which is less distorting of our moral and politicallife. 19 He asks, "Does the model distort reality? Does it blind us to real differences and similarities and generate other, fictitious ones? Does it suppress, violate, invent, deceive?,,20 Berlin's insight into

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the common world of public values leads him to an understanding of the most adequate and least distorting concept of the human nature within the contemporary form of life as fundamentally pluralistic, as giving rise to a diversity of distinct but similarly plausible models, outlooks, and scales of values, each with its own ultimate values and ends. 21 Berlin's central descriptive insight can then be summarized as follows: The world that we encounter in actual experience is one in which we are faced with choices between ends equally ultimate, and claims equally absolute, the realization of sorne of which must inevitably involve the sacrifice of others .... 'h '1 elt er persona1or SOCla .22 Berlin's view ofhuman nature should not be misunderstood, however, as infinitely pluralistic. "Incompatible these ends may be; but their variety cannot be unlimited .... ,,23 He is anxious to make clear that the expressions of human nature are bounded by three things within the form of life: on the one hand, as introduced in chapter 3, they are framed by relatively more stable common elements, the physical components of human nature (hunger, sleep, pain) and the basic categories of experience (reason, language, imagination) and on the other hand with engagement with the more protean component of particular values within the form of life. Each of these features of human nature is of course potentially subject to unpredictable transformation, but short ofthat eventuality, there are limits to what we can understand here and now. A creature which was immortal, or could not reason, or none ofwhose values were recognizable would not, in Berlin's estimate, be recognizable as "fully human." "But within the limits ofhumanity the variety of ends, finite though it is, can be extensive." This basic insight forms the core of Berlin's political thought and the fount ofhis opposition to ethical monism. Berlin's own basic model of contemporary moral and politicallife draws on this pluralistic conception of human nature and on objective values consonant with it. Of course, the modem form of life is by no means unique in reflecting a pluralistic experience of human nature. Berlin clearly believes that most human forms of life are pluralistic, whether they self-consciously acknowledge it or not. Nonetheless, he does acknowledge that there have been, albeit rarely, cultures dominated "by only one model that determines [their] thought, ,,24 and presumably a single, unified conception of human nature that informs it. What distinguishes different pluralistic forms of life are the different basic models and therefore different objective values to which they give rise.
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Berlin's essential self-understanding ofhuman nature can, 1 suggest, be roughly summarized as follows: human beings as we know them are (l) rational, (2) language using (3) imaginative, (4) membership requiring, (5) unpredictably self-transforming, (6) moral agents,25 who (7) share sorne values and ends and experiences such as "freedom, suffering, happiness, productivity, good and bad, right and wrong, choice, effort, truth, illusion."26 These categories and values seem to exhibit virtually universal resonance at least in sorne form within the 'human horizon' as we understand it. At various junctures Berlin refers to other values and virtues which seem to approach a quasi-universal status, including justice, mercy and courage. The quasi-universal values are complemented with a range of values of more recent vintage, including politicalliberty (positive and negative), equality, justice, community, pluralism, tolerance, civility, and sincerity.27 Together these quasi-universal and historical values set the range of equally ultimate claims for Berlin's basic mode! of contemporary Western moral and politicallife. They are aIl recognizable from our situated position. This model is broadly similar to that which he attributes to Mill in the last epigram at the beginning of this dissertation. Berlin understands each of these features of particular human nature in very general terms which allow for a wide latitude of interpretation; for example, he adopts a very loose understanding of "reason" as a general category of human life - as, at least, being able to offer sorne explanations, to compare and weigh different claims, to recognize 28 contradictions, for example. What rationality means ... is that my choices are not arbitrary, incapable of rational defence, but can be explained in terms of my scale of values - my plan or way of life, an entire outlook which cannot but be to a high degree connected with that of others who form the society, nation, party, church, class, species to which 1 belong. 29 Berlin declares that what he means as "being rational" is being able to "give excellent reasons" for what one does or decides or says.30 What is key here is that Berlin wants sorne flexibility for diverse forms and standards of reasoning as hound up with diverse outlooks. His standard seems to be that forms of reason are in sorne degree shared and recognizable. Empirical reasoning, for example, in sorne form and in sorne capacity seems almost a necessary concomitant of human society. This is obviously a much more flexible understanding of reason than that which characterizes say Kantian or

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deontological political theories, in which very specifie and rigorous standards of reason are called for, such as consistency with the principle of generalization?l Berlin however affirms explicitly that he does not see reason as bound up with universal mIes, but rather with what can be recognized or understood. As with human nature there are common patterns, like the principle of non-contradiction, or the preference for wider explanatory force, but not a priori mles. 32 Berlin's historicized interpretation ofhuman nature forms the ground ofhis basic model of modern Western moral and politicallife as informed by a pluralistic range of recognizable, and in that sense objective, values. This basic model, however, remains interpretive, and its credibility relies on continuaI resistance to falsification by alternative models. Berlin defends this basic model as at least as plausible as alternatives, and in his view as the most adequate and least distorting contemporary self-understanding. Berlin advances four main lines of criticism against alternative models. 33 First, it may be that beliefs are simply beyond the pale of what we are capable of understanding, or with which we are able to communicate. Berlin holds that the potential for human communication is extremely broad. Nonetheless, there are limits, and where the possibility of understanding breaks down, we have to speak in terms of "madness" and "incomplete humanity.,,34 Second, Berlin challenges views which he argues rely on "empirically false beliefs,,35 - for example, the Nazi daim of the Jews as Untermenschen 36 - or which are internally incoherent in terms oftheir own recognizable frames ofthoughtsuch as Hamann's reasoned rejection of reason. 37 Third, he is interested in challenging views which call for a fundamental transposition of values or outlook, but which are unable to provide any adequate warrant for this demand - for example, his incompatibilist argument against determinism. 38 Finally, he is interested in argumentatively challenging views which are not consonant with the descriptive character of contemporary human nature - as in, for example, his arguments against monism. 39
Models which fit these four classifications may seem less attractive once their full

implications are excavated. Berlin's goal is always, first, persuasion. He hopes to convert those who hold such beliefs by exposingtheir weaknesses. Ifthis fails, however, he argues we should still strive to allow for such views and their expression and recognize that the happiness of the people who hold them may be bound up with these views, even if

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they horrify us. 40 Indeed, Berlin recognizes that there is value in such views, both as helping us ta more clearly come to grips with our own views, their strengths, weaknesses and limits, and as expressions ofhuman diversity.41 Nonetheless, ifwe are threatened by the beliefs such models spawn, then we may have to defend ourselves. 42 His essential point, however, is that such models and attendant values may be incorporated as real human possibilities but not as objective values into a basic model which seeks to avoid distortion. We should recognize that the suppression of such beliefs will make those who 43 hold them unhappy, and that is to be avoided ifit reasonably can be. We do not recognize, however, that the suppression of such beliefs will do them Irremediable harm. 44 This historicist Interpretation of Berlin' s thought suggests something of the different senses in which Berlin employs the idea ofhuman nature, and thus helps to explain one of the points of confusion in interpreting his work. Historicized human nature includes both local features and sorne which appear virtually universal from our situated position. 45 For example, in-so-far as at least sorne values appear to be quasiuniversal, we have reason to believe that pluralism may break out in virtually any culture or epoch, so that at least the possibility ofpluralism appears to be shared. 46 On the other hand, the precise character of the pluralism which does break out may be unique. Reading Berlin in this moderately but consistently historicist fashion helps to illuminate why sorne critics like Ignatieff have seen his view of human nature as purely naturalistic, while Gray sees it as radically historicist, and Galipeau sees it as a combination. It also helps to show how they each only grasp part of the puzzle - Berlin's is a consistently moderate historicist view which includes, perforee, sorne quasi-universal elements. There is also an illuminating duality in Berlin's treatment of pluralism. Berlin seems to argue that once we recognize our morallife as pluralistic, then we can also recognize that pluralism is a desirable condition, an admirable ideal, worthy of preservation. As with human nature, two distinct but consistent senses of pluralism are perceptible here. There is a descriptive meta-ethical c1aim about the character of moral and political models and life in the contemporary West as encompassing a range of objective and sometimes rivalrous values embedded in Berlin's view ofhuman nature. There is also a normative sense ofpluralism bound up with Berlin's critical elaboration of his basic model, which includes pluralism as itself one of the range of values Berlin

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argues are objectively recognizable, defensible, and worthy ofbeing upheld. This latter sense of pluralism is part of a more critical and argumentative interpretation of what human beings are and should be Ifthis account is correct then the structure ofBerlin's moral and political thought can be described as, in Dzur's terms, a thick (or normative) pluralism wrapped within a thin (descriptive) pluralism. 47 The baseline ofhis thought then would be his descriptive account ofpluralist human nature within the modern form of life, and its argumentative aspiration would be, at least in part, to inspire an enthusiastic embrace of this condition. In summary, Berlin offers a combination ofhistorical and philosophical interpretation as a basis for his central daim of recognizable pluralism in the modern West. His interpretation focuses on the self-understanding of a historicized human nature. This understanding ofhuman nature embraces recognizable, and in that sense objective, pluralism both as a descriptive condition and as itself an ultimate value. His case, however, does not rely on daims either to moral certainty or universality, or on purely conceptual analysis, but on a plausible interpretive understanding.
S.iii Supporting the Precarious Equilibrium

With the supporting structure that moderate historicism provides for Berlin's thought now on the table, I will turn to sorne of the main arguments Berlin pursues from this general framework to his particular political vision, and how these are reflected in, and provide sorne direction and coherence to, his highly diverse body of his work. The basic structure of Berlin's political case for a loose and agitated public sphere draws on these core insights, both in terms of the pluralism ofhuman nature and his basic model of the specifie objective values in terms of which this pluralism is expressed. His work (1) provides a strong descriptive empirical and interpretive case for the plausibility of understanding the modern Western condition as strongly pluralistic in the descriptive meta-ethical sense described above, and argues from this towards the 100 se construction of the public sphere along four main lines (focusing on justification, radical choice, tragic choice and consequence); (2) introduces the pluralist ideal which he defends as a further consideration in favor of the 100 se equilibrium; (3) appeals to the importance of membership within a community, and of recognition within that community as a basis for the recognition of a wide range of ultimate values; (4) introduces a historicist theme

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which speaks to the importance of the flexibility of the public sphere to transformative change; and (5) appeals to the importance of communication and imaginative understanding to a humane, healthy and stable body politic. The ultimate appeal, in the tradition of political theory as Berlin understands it, is an appeal to human nature - here to the empirically and interpretively grounded particular image of Western man. Berlin's arguments proceed on the basis of a moderate and consistent historicism, plausibly grounded in historical, sociological, cultural and anthropological studies, and re-enforced by his own work in the history of ideas. His essays on historiography provide a general explication and defense ofhis basic methodology, particularly against modern alternative approaches. 48 In particular, his essays on Vico and Herder, and their influence on "The Divorce Between the Sciences and the Humanities," lay out the main premises ofhis approach to the humanities in general, including his notions of cultural and historical diversity and the central role of sympathetic understanding combined with a heavy emphasis on empiricism. The central premise which he is concerned to establish is the contemporary pluralist condition. In the next few pages I will briefly summarize sorne of the diverse researches Berlin brings to the support of this central contention. Characteristically, he approaches the problem from a wide range of angles in hopes of formulating as persuasive a case as possible for as many diverse readers as possible. The idea of the deep and at least sometimes radical clash of values, even ultimate values, is a perceptible common theme of each of these diverse sets of essays. On one hand, his conceptual studies, focusing on the concepts of equality and liberty, develop the notion of internai conceptual pluralism, apparent not only in the manner in which scholars employ the terms but also the way in which they circulate in popular discourse, while in essays like "From Hope and Fear Set Free" he advances a characteristic case of external pluralistic collision between values which had traditionally been assumed to be complementary, for
example, freedom and knowledge. At the same time, Berlin's political essays,

particularly "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," "Philosophy and Government Repression," and particularly his various essays on the rise of nationalism as a widespread modern value in competition with longer established values, reveal a more general pluralism of values.

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From a different angle, Berlin's early philosophical essays develop the same theme, focusing on the failure of Western philosophy, and particularly positivism, to isolate any basic criterion for assessing the validity of diverse propositions and statements. His focus is on demonstrating the irreducable pluralism of meaningful statements. The final and culminating paper, "Logical Translation," condemns the whole effort at a unifying positivist or phenomenological framework as succumbing to an unwarranted monist presupposition. Obviously, this work focuses on the modem West. Berlin' s extensive expositions of a wide variety of infiuential individual Western thinkers outside the liberal mainstream, from Sorel to de Maistre, to Hess, Meinecke, Herzen and Weizmann, and above all his book on Hamann and his manifold work on Marx and on Soviet Marxists, focus on exposing and criticizing the diversity ofbasic models and values in the West on an individual, case by case basis. Occasional essays on important liberal thinkers like Kant and Mill set up points of contrast, and in the latter case also allows for arguments directly to pluralism as a great and potentially ultimate value. As Galipeau puts it, " ... his writing in the history of ideas focuses on the plurality ofworld-views exhibited by Western civilizations and great thinkers in Western thought.,,49 His essays on the diverse moral perspectives of artists and critics, such as Toistoy, Turgenev and Belinsky deepen this exploration of pluralism. At a greater level of abstraction, Berlin's history of ideas drives consistently to the same conclusion. In particular, his book on The Age ofEnlightenment sets up a fundamental and incommensurable clash of ideas, values, basic models, with the 19th century romantics, who formed a subject of continuing fascination for Berlin. Sorne of Berlin's most important work in this area has only recently come into wide circulation, and it is worth pausing here for a moment to consider how this work drives directly back to his central theme of the basic pluralism of the modem Western condition. Berlin argues forcefully that the basic romantic model entered into, and irreversibly transformed, our Western consciousness, not completely perhaps, but down to its roots. Romanticism cracked contemporary consciousness just as the re-birth of classicism cracked it in Machiavelli's time. Berlin's point is not that the fissure Machiavelli revealed has healed, but only that it does not plague most of us the way it did the citizens ofhis European Christendom. Romanticism is the primary case study in

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Berlin's investigation of the contemporary roots of strong pluralism. What is important for Berlin is how deeply the romantic model, particularly of the restrained Herderian variety, informs contemporary thought, and the duality in thought and value that this has produced. His attitude in making this claim is descriptive, but the centrality of pluralism, the focus on the particular, the defence of the individual conscience, the need to belong and tragedy aU suggest that romanticism deeply affected Berlin's own moral and political thought. Ultimately, what he argues is that not only does the world look pluralistic from where we stand, but also that we have good reasons to want it to stay that way. This is a romantic ideal as deeply held as the Enlightenment values of liberty and humanity. Berlin attributes enormous importance to the romantic revolution in thought, indeed, "it seems to [him] the greatest yet." Eisewhere he writes that he "hope[s] to show that this revolution is the deepest and most lasting change oflife in the West.... after which nothing was ever the same."s Berlin devotes a great deal of writing to exploring the thesis that the romantic revolt introduced new basic models of human nature and life, which, ifthey did not entirely succeed in supplanting the formerly dominant Enlightenment models, nonetheless firmly established themselves beside them as rivaIs. SI The core theme of Berlin's historical studies is consequently that "we are children ofboth worlds,,,S2 the "heirs oftwo traditions,,,S3 both Enlightenment and romantic. This is the point that the epigrams at the beginning of this paper are focused on bringing out - that our moral and political thought, our values and ideals, even our concepts and our very identities are formed by attachments to deeply divergent basic models, ofwhich the romantic-enlightenment division is a palpable example. On the one hand this enriches our lives and thought by vastly expanding "field within which we now osciUate freely."s4 On the other, having our feet in both (and likely more) traditions generates a danger of profound and potentially irresolvable conflicts, of radical choices. The thread of Berlin' s historical argument, then, is that by developing and powerful1y defending its own basic model in sharp contradistinction to established Enlightenment models, romanticism seriously damaged the monist presuppositions which had sustained both the various Christian and the Enlightenment worldviews. In this way, "romanticism cracked" what Berlin caUs "the backbone ofthe main Western tradition";ss elsewhere he declares, "the unitary European world was shattered by it."S6 Berlin's

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rhetoric here is appropriate1y strong, but still allows for the survival of the established models, despite their fractured or problematized status. In the last century, Berlin even argues that the values embedded within traditional models have experienced a revival, although now in a far more complex, internally divided moral and political world. 57 What then is this revolutionary romantic model which did so much to re-shape European consciousness? Berlin ultimately identifies two propositions which he argues constitute "the heart of romanticism,,58: the first proposition asserts "the notion of the indomitable will, not knowledge of values, but their creation, is what men achieve;,,59 and "The second proposition connected with the first is that there is no structure of

things .... There is only... the endless self-creativity of the universe.,,60 These propositions form the basis for a new basic model of man as ultimately a free, creative artist of himse1f, with corresponding reconstructions of morality and politics: "Moralityand politics so far as it is social morality - is a creative process: the new romantic model is that of art.,,6\ The basic romantic model involves The rejection of the central principles of the Enlightenment - universality, objectivity, rationality, the capacity to provide permanent solutions to aU genuine problems of life or thought, and ... the accessibility of rational methods to any thinker armed with adequate powers of observation and logical thinking. 62 Moreover, as the example of models of morality and politics already begin to suggest, the essential differences of outlook pervade a very wide range of human life and experience for example, inc1uding the kinds of goods and virtues and ideals they recognize, as weU as in terms of basic public institutions, like the law, and in conceptions ofhistory, art, religion, and other areas of human life. 63 In terms of their basic models of morallife, Berlin sees the romantics appealing to a "morality of intention" against the dominant enlightenment "morality of consequence.,,64 In regards to strictly political models, the romantics insisted on particularity, on fundamental differences between cultures, peoples and civilizations, as against the universalist, cosmopolitan models characteristic of the Enlightenment. On the issue of virtues, goods, and ideals "What matters now is motive, integrity, sincerity, fidelity in principle, purity ofheart, spontaneity; not happiness or strength or wisdom or success, or natural beauty or other natural values" characteristic of Enlightenment thought. Instead of the mechanical, and rationalist conceptions of the state and the law, the romantics formulate organic and tradition-based models. 65
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In identifying these basic models, Berlin does not try to assimilate aU romantics (or on the other side aU Enlightenment thinkers) to any strict Procrustean bed. The models inform thought, but can be developed in a wide variety of directions, so that there were conservative, revolutionary, liberal and reactionary romantics, as there were many types of Enlightenment thinkers. He argues, however, that the general presence of the basic models can be shown empiricaUy with a great deal of plausibility and consistency. Nonetheless, there were sorne points of distinction among romantics which deserve special attention. Berlin draws what is for him a very important line of distinction between 'restrained' romantics, like Herder, or Schiller and 'unbridled' romantics, like Fichte or Nietzsche. 66 The essential difference can be summed up this way, the unbridled romantics carried the romantic model to the extreme of rejecting the virtues and ideals of the Enlightenment per se, as offensive to man's essential nature thus rationality, generalization, happiness, universality, are to be repudiated utterly from the very beginning, for they innately interfere with the artistic self-realization of human beings. The 'restrained' romantics do not protest so much at the Enlightenment values and concepts per se, but at the predominant significance they assumed. These values, ideals and concepts may still find a place on 'restrained' models but are now downgraded from their formerly overweening authority to subordinate places on a new model which reformulates basic human nature to aUow for a diversity of possibilities. Berlin evinces a great deal of sympathy with the restrained romantics in general, and with Herder in particular. Indeed, he allows that a number ofhis own, most formative ideas are drawn from, or at least guided by, Herder, inc1uding populism ("the belief in the value of belonging to a group or culture,,67), expressionism and pluralism. He is manifestly more skeptical of the extreme romantics, although, it is worth emphasizing that he does not find them devoid ofvaluable critiques, insights and ideas. 68 His critiques of extreme romantic theories focus typicaUy on their empirical implausibility, on their internal
failure to warrant key assumptions, as well as the potentially (and at times historically)

disastrous consequences oftheir application - in particular, he sees fascism, extreme nationalism, and brutal irrationalism of various kinds growing out unbridled romanticism. 69

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In summary, the citizens of the modem West are 'heirs' or 'children' ofboth models, oscillating between them in a fashion which may not be strictly intellectually coherent, but which is necessary to the richness and diversity we recognize in the world, and are loathe to surrender. It is easy enough then to see that the situation in which we find ourselves is strongly pluralistic, and how radical and tragic choices can develop. These conceptual, historical, biographical and political analyses Berlin brings to bear to support his basic descriptive pluralist premise put him in a position to forcefully launch four basic arguments against monism, and the idea of a rigidly structured public sphere: (1) an argument of justification; (2) an argument based on radical choice; (3) an argument based on tragic conflict; and (4) an argument based on consequence. The first argument is particularly important in philosophical debate over monism. Beginning from the established premise of a general pluralist condition, Berlin argues that monism is incompatible with Western common sense and experience of the basic pluralism of values, models and concepts. 70 It therefore faces a special problem of justification in explaining why Westerners should set aside this direct experience, and accept that there is sorne one value or compossible set of values which can organize diverse moral and political commitments in sorne satisfactory fashion. The second argument focuses on radical choice and the breakdown of reason, or transitivity, in the face of incommensurable incompatibles. The essential contention here is that reason will not consistently sustain a privilege for any one value in public and private life under the fol1owing conditions: (a.) the form of life contains a diversity of concepts of human nature, basic models, and ultimate values; (b.) these concepts of human nature, basic models and values may be incommensurable, or in other ways incomparable; (c.) these concepts of human nature, basic models and most notably values, may conflict so that they are in various degrees incompatible; (d.) Berlin further holds that the manner in which diverse forms oflife, basic models and values will interact in particular cases is variant and not strictly predictable. 71 (e.) As a consequence, no comprehensive synthesis of goods or highest good can be established by reason. This argument serves to undercut any direct appeal to reason itself in justification of an overriding value. On the other hand, it by no means prec1udes reasoned arguments from

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other considerations, such as efficiency or stability or predictability. Berlin's response to this situation is characteristically that since we have no means of impartially determining a dominant principle in moral or politicallife, we have need to work the issues out on a case by case basis, for "not all arguments will be of equivalent weight in a particular case." 72 In order to so work cases out, we will need access to a wide range of relevant values, and hence the
100 se

equilibrium of public life.

Berlin also introduces the notion of tragic conflict as an extension or an extreme case of radical conflict. Berlin argues that at least the bare possibility of tragic conflict is ine1iminable on our best understanding of quasi-universal human nature, in which pluralism can seemingly always break out:

If, as 1 believe, the ends of men are many, and not all ofthem are in principle compatible with each other, then the possibility of conflict - and of tragedy can never wholly be e1iminated from human life, either personal or social. 73
This problem of tragic conflict can arise within or between individuals, groups, societies or civilizations. The sense in which Berlin seems to be employing 'absolute' as opposed to ultimate conflict here is that tragic conflicts not only encompass competing ultimate values, but occur where the incompatibility between them penetrates all the way down to their minimum thresholds. Berlin characterizes tragedy as "choosing between absolute claims." He sees the problems of moral and political tragedy re-emerging in Western thought with Machiavaelli. A life of classical republican virtu would not leave room for a minimally adequate Christian life, and vice versa. Taking Berlin's references on the subject together, a rough definition oftragic conflict can be given as characterized by (a.) the deeply incompatible, (b.) incommensurable, (c.) and inescapable clash of(d.) ultimate values between civilizations, cultures, groups or individuals in relation to concrete issues or cases. Tragic conflict can then be understood as a sub-class of radical conflicts; specifically, radical conflicts become tragic where the clashes they involve penetrate deeply into the incompatibilities of ultimate values, so that minimum thresholds are necessarily broached and irremediable harm is done. Berlin's argument here appears to be that, first, tragic conflict is more effectively avoidable and manageable when there is clear recognition of the competing ultimate values, and consequently of the cases in which they are in danger of clashing. In other

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words, tragic conflict will be more evitable where it occurs in the public sphere, or, by analogy, within a self-aware individual, group or society. The alternative scenario of one value being publicly recognized, and the other not, seems like a formula for the oppression and deep infringement of the latter value. A public sphere framed as a loose equilibrium (as opposed to a rigid hierarchy) will have greater flexibility to make the compromises and tradeoffs necessary to effectively evade the conflict: ... we must engage in what are called tradeoffs - rules, values, principles must yield to each other in varying degrees in specific situations.... The best that can be done, as a general rule, is to maintain a precarious equilibrium that will prevent the occurrence of desperate situations, of intolerable choices.... The concrete situation is almost everything. There is no escape: we must decide as we decide; moral risk cannot, at times, be avoided. 74 Finally, where a tragic conflict cannot be headed off, in effect becomes inescapable, and a choice must ultimately be made, there are again advantages to its being played out selfconsciously in public life. Evidently, such a choice, particularly where the options are stark, may be deeply divisive, and particularly difficult for those whose value is not in the end respected. Nevertheless, where there is a recognition of a value, there is an opportunity to present arguments for it in the particular case, and an on-going hope of public persuasion in future cases (although the particular case in question may not be amenable ofreturn). What is essential from Berlin's perspective is that the discourse be flexible, open and contingent - never final and absolute - and that diverse claims grounded in the multiplicity ofultimate values be considered, however agonizing the process. An uneasy equilibrium which recognizes the diversity of equally ultimate values should be maintained. Above aIl, the basic framework of politicallife, be it constitutional or conventional, should be interpreted as providing loose guidelines, open to interpretation, revision, exception, and compromise. Given the strong case that he argues can be made for an irreducible plurality of ultimate values and basic models characterizing modem Western societies, there is a case to be made that the embrace of a significant degree of moral risk offers the best basis for stability in Western societies. In essence, Berlin advocates a political structure loose and flexible enough to support radical, and possibly tragic, conflict.

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Evidently, it may be argued that the very possibility of radical and tragic conflict could be socially destabilizing, and may itself constitute a reason for the general withdrawal of the state from potentially de-stabilizing conflict. To this, however, Berlin might respond (one) that the nature of sorne of the values themselves, such as justice and equality, calI for collective and coordinated administration through the state apparatus; (two) that there is no neutral position available to the state - the idea of a withdrawal to a purely regulative function implies in effect a sharp privilege for negative liberty over competing values that rely on an activist state; and (three) that given the internaI conceptual plurality ofultimate values like liberty and equality, the proposed withdrawal would still not eliminate the problem of pluralistic contestation. Finally, there is Berlin's argument from consequence: the monist presumption either in philosophy or in the rigid prior framing of the public sphere must rely on a daim of certainty ofwhat is good for people, at any rate 'these' people, either implicitly or explicitly. In essence, Berlin retorts that such "Certainty is one of the great justifications offanaticism, compulsion and persecution.,,75 This remark hearkens back to his comments seen in Chapter 3, identifying certainty as the root ofmost political evils. The argument amounts to the daim that not only are certainties in general unwarranted in moral and political affairs, but that they are highly dangerous, even when asserted initially for the most just, humane and commendable of purposes. Once accepted in principle, certainties may, under changing circumstances, become a basis for intolerance, compulsion and persecution. The only antidote against the danger of intolerance and compulsion is a healthy dose of modesty in moral and political theory and action, a recognition of the contingency even of the most sacred moral and political principles, and consequently an open disposition to their perpetuaI contestation. The point is not necessarily that all monism is fanatical or oppressive, but rather that, in Berlin's view, all fanaticism and oppression is monistic - "monism," he writes, "is at the root of every cxtrcmism.,,76 Thus, "Pluralism is the best of aH antidotes ta authoritarianism and paternalism, even if one considers their purposes to be wholly rational."n This contrast then leads into Berlin's constructive case for pluralism. Thus far, this analysis suggests that Berlin can make a strong historical, empirical and interpretive case for the plausibility of pluralism as a basic condition without

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appealing to conditions of certain moral knowledge, and that the recognition of such a condition already provides sorne reasonsfor favoring a loose and open-ended construction of the public sphere. At this point Berlin can extend his case by adding the normative argument for pluralism as an ideal: firstly, that pluralism itself, diversity of human forms of life, constitutes an ultimate good worthy of state recognition and affirmation in the public sphere. Now, this may not be a terribly appealing ideal in-andof-itselffor those inclined to monism, but it may nonetheless appeal to many, and even those who cannot endorse it as a principle in-itself, may corne to embrace it in light of other considerations. The ideal of pluralism also permits the independent recognition of a range of ultimate values as ends-in-themselves, so that it is possible to affirm liberty, equality, community, justice and other values in their full ranges, and not merely as subordinate or as they may be affirmed within a complex hierarchy of values. In particular, the pluralist ideal conduces to the expression and the range of liberty. It extends the range of serious argumentation which can be offered in public life, and at the same time extends the range of freedom to constitute, or re-constitute oneself in terms of a range of publicly recognized values, at the individual, group, or even nationallevel. Finally, it is a humane ideal which inculcates a spirit oftolerance. These themes pervade Berlin's essays, whether philosophical or historical, but a few in which he gives particularly impassioned normative defenses include his essay on "Montesquieu," on "Two Concepts of Liberty," "The Pursuit of the Ideal," "Does Political Philosophy Still Exist," and particularly in "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," where he heaps praise on Mill' s demand that the truth must be continually contested, on his championing of diverse 'experiments in living,' on his condemnation of the "deep slumber of settled opinion," and on his claim that "ifthere were no genuine dissenters, that there is an obligation to invent arguments against ourselves,,,78 and his insistence that the "imposition of any ... [theoretical] construction upon a living society is bound, in his [i.e., Mill' s] favorite words of warning, to dwarf, maim, cramp and wither the human faculties." 79 By the same token, of course, the ideal of pluralism can be opposed on a range of similar grounds. It may be said to be inefficient, to encourage unnecessary and divisive debate, to water-down the national character, to focus on differences rather than

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commonalities, and to effect irregular and hence unjust and unpredictable outcomes. One point Berlin would certainly want to raise in response to these objections is that extreme particular cases will often exhibit a degree of commensurability, and consequently will not encourage these outcomes. The point, however, is not that the normative case for pluralism necessarily trumps that for monism, although Berlin at least clearly feels it is the stronger, but that it appears as at least highly reasonable. The next point to be introduced is that the pluralist construction of the public sphere allows for a wider sense ofbelonging, in that a wider range ofultimate values can be recognized, and a wider range of arguments acknowledged. Berlin's essays on "The Search for Status," his frequent focus on issues of recognition and inclusion, even his essays on Zionism, suggest a need for a diverse and open public sphere, encouraging to diversity and contestation, able to recognize citizens in terms meaningful to them, so that they may feel at home. 80 In multicultural Western societies, "the sense of belonging" of which Berlin is a champion, can be diversified in terms of the recognition of political values. 81 Political identification, moreover, may be argued to have the advantage of cutting across more regional, local and ascriptive identifications, and consequently to inculcate more diverse relationships and group affiliations. It may also be said to render the public sphere a more "expressive" locus, reflecting a wider array of nationallife and identifications. 82 The essence of this point is that, as Gray has it, for Berlin "there is an ineliminable public or communal dimension of individual well-being for all, or almost all, human beings.,,83 An integral aspect ofthis well-being is to be recognized, to be understood, to have one's values acknowledged, and to have the opportunity to participate fully in public affairs in terms ofthose values: Human beings need to have their particular identities and forms of life reflected or mirrored, in forms recognizable to them, in the institutions of their societies. If this is denied to them, they williack an essential element of human dignity, even if they possess negative liberty to the highest degree, for they will be unable to recognize themselves, to see themselves reflected, in the institutions which confer negative liberty upon them. 84

In arguing this way for a diversified public sphere which rejects any single
overriding value and seeks rather to reflect something of the diversity of ultimate values embodied in their constituencies, Berlin is joined by other eminent English pluralists.

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Steven Lukes, for example, argues that once the argument has been effectively made that there are no "uniquely determinate solutions rationally compelling upon all," it can be inferred that "for the state to impose any single solution on sorne of its citizens is thus (not only from their standpoint) unreasonable.,,85 Bernard Williams takes the point considerably further when he argues "if there are many and competing genuine values, then the greater the extent to which a society tends to be single valued, the more genuine values it neglects or suppresses. More, to this extent, must mean better.,,86 Berlin's vision of an untidy and open-ended equilibrium, embracing the main ultimate values recognizable within a society, no doubt falls somewhat short of Williams' 'more must mean better.' Berlin is always anxious to strike a workable balance, but the openendedness of his conception of public life does allow for a very wide range of values. Moreover, the looser and more flexible formation of the public sphere conduces to a central historicist insight prominent in Berlin's work. This may be summarized in a remark Berlin makes in severallocations concerning Hegel: The history of thought and culture is, as Hegel showed with great brilliance, a changing pattern of great liberating ideas which inevitably turn into suffocating strait-jackets, and so stimulate their own destruction by new, emancipating, and at the same time enslaving conceptions.87 This consideration lines up nicely with Berlin's championing ofheterodoxy, of continuaI criticism, agitation, of the unpredictability of historicai developments, and with his image of humanity as, among other things, an unpredictably self-transforming species. Final1y, and most importantly, there is Berlin's central image of piuraiism as reflective of people' s capacity to disagree, and yet draw Iight form each other. Through conflict one can learn to better understand one's interlocutor, and ultimately oneself. 88 The development of the sympathetic imagination diminishes intolerance and fanaticism: If you succeed, or even think you have succeeded, in understanding in what way individuals, groups, nations, entire civilizations differ from one another and, by an effort of imagination, "enter" into their thoughts and feelings, imagine how you yourself, placed in their circumstances, could view the world, or view yourself in relation to others; then, even if you are repelled by what you find. .. this must diminish blind intolerance and fanaticism. Imagination can feed fanaticism, but imaginative insight into situations very different from yours must weaken it.,,89 Berlin' s continuaI focus is on engaging and "understanding people who oppose us.,,90

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The historicist interpretation finally also allows us to understand the role of negative liberty better, for while it is on the one hand equally ultimate with other values, it is also a particular expression of our own culture and civilization. Berlin identifies it as a special discovery, perhaps even unique to the West, whose decline or loss "would mark the collapse of a civilization." While this does not privilege it over other values, it does at least warrant its necessary inclusion among them. By recognizing the historicist and particularist element of his thought, we are able then finally to see the special role that negative liberty does play in his thought, not as a prior or dominant value, but, by his lights, as a critical and indispensable component of a just and humane political equilibrium. Not only is negative liberty identified as an ultimate value in itself, but also as that value which is most expressive ofthe distinct character of the modern West. It has proved itselfhistorically as a comparatively humane principle, and indeed has a special role in balancing and civilizing positive liberty. This helps to explain his remark that "pluralism and liberalism are not the same or even overlapping concepts ... l believe in both liberalism and pluralism, but they are not logically connected.,,9\ Liberalism, and the ultimate value of negative liberty, has its own sources ofjustification. This is not to say that liberalism and pluralism are not potentially complementary, particularly where the liberalism in question is comparatively tolerant and inclusive. It is, however, to question all of the attempts that have been made in relation to Berlin's thought to derive his liberal commitments directly from his pluralism. In summary, what is the character of Berlin's case for political pluralism? In a word, it is diverse. Berlin's work seems to be best comprehensible through the lens of an empiricist examination and a historicist imaginative reconstruction of the modern condition of strong and recognizable pluralism which leads him in turn to embrace a political vision focused on an open, unstable and agitated political equilibrium embracing a limited but open-ended range of ultimate values. There is on one hand the wealth of interprctive historical examination, of imaginative reconstruction of historical figures, on a second the distinctive expressivist artistic explorations, and on the third, the wealth of conceptual, empirical and interpretive political and philosophical studies. Throughout this work Berlin persistently exhibits the features of a moderate but consistent historicist.

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5.iv The Monist Rejoinder

1will at this point consider three important critiques of Berlin's position, particularly in terms of its application to public values, specifically (1) the monist rejoinder, (2) the challenge ofhermeneutics, and (3) the charge ofrelativism. The main focus in each case is not the idea of moral pluralism in general, but really its application to politicallife whether the idea of the pluralism of political values should guide us in public life. The monist rejoinder to Berlin's thought, both at the descriptive and normative levels, is given a powerful articulation by Ronald Dworkin in the recently published book, The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin. 1 will focus first on the descriptive rejoinder, and then show how this carries over into a normative debate about the values of pluralism and monism. Dworkin's purpose is to dispute the proposition which he attributes to Berlin that sometimes value claims conflict in such a way that "we know that nothing that we do is right because, whatever we do, we do something wrong."n Regardless ofhow we decide, we must choose against a legitimate value claim, and therefore do a wrong. He characterizes Berlin's ambitious thesis as the claim that we can know with certainty that values generally conflict in such a way as to necessitate a wrong. The thrust of Dworkin's critique is that it is not necessarily true that value conflicts do involve a wrong, and moreover that it may be that moral and political theory can formulate values so that they can be harmoniously realized, or at any rate far more harmoniously than Berlin suggests. He concludes that Berlin was unable to back-up the certainty he claimed about the contemporary pluralistic condition. If Dworkin's claim that Berlin exaggerates the friction between values is plausible, it would cut close to the base of Berlin's thought, undercutting the whole descriptive basis ofpluralism so that Berlin's arguments against monism from justification as well as from radical and tragic choice would not necessarily bear out the pluralist premise. In terms of Berlin's positive arguments for a pluralistic public life, Dworkin's position could then at least partial1y accommodate Berlin's argument from the importance ofbelonging, ofhaving one's values reflected in public life, since a range of values could be represented without friction within a monist framework. Much of the strength would also be drained from Berlin's argument concerning the education of the imagination to tolerance through contestation, since at least many values would prove

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compatible. Dworkin's thesis would not, however, necessarily diminish Berlin's arguments from historicism, from consequence or from the value of pluralism. One difficulty with Dworkin's critique is the attribution of an unsustainable claim of certainty to Berlin. The moderate historicist reading helps us to understand that Berlin's claim is to a best interpretation, not to a moral certainty, and immediately this removes much of the bite from Dworkin' s rejoinder. Dworkin himself admits that it may weil be the case that values do conflict in the way Berlin suggests, although as we wiU see he wants to resist this conclusion until the last minute. An important further difficulty with Dworkin's critique, however, derives from his assumption that this condition of necessarily doing a wrong applies in Berlin's estimate to aU value conflicts rather than only to certain types. Dworkin takes up Berlin's 'paradigm' case ofliberty and equality as an iUustrative example. He then undertakes a two-tiered critique: first, he tries to show that the effectiveness of Berlin's argument relies on a key presupposition, that is, the way the values are defined. He then goes on to show that the key content of at least one of Berlin' s definitions, that of liberty, is not very credible. Once a more plausible definition of liberty is introduced, Berlin' s original argument is vitiated. 1 will argue, however, that a plausible case can be offered in defense of Berlin' s proposition, on the basis that (i.) Berlin's definitions are not discredited in the fashion that Dworkin suggests, (ii.) that Dworkin's alternate definition is itself arguably deficient in sorne important respects, and at any rate (iii.) threatens to reproduce the very conflict that it was introduced to eliminate, and (iv) that Berlin's formulation exhibits resources lacking in Dworkin's alternative. Ifwe accept Dworkin's premise that this discussion provides a paradigm case, then it offers sorne reason to think that the monist retort to Berlin's pluralism is not necessarily very convincing. Dworkin poses the question "Do liberty and equality, now considered as abstract values, confliet in sorne way that explains why a political community might find itself not merely uncertain about what to do but certain that it must do wrong whatever it does?,,93 [ia] He argues that this claim involves showing that values clash in a "tragic way," producing an "irredeemable moral stain," and leaving those who choose with the sense that they have done "a grave wrong.,,94 Dworkin suggests that the answer depends on a

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prior question, "on what we mean by liberty and equality.,,95 He allows that conflict between these values will often be tragic in this way on Berlin's definition of liberty as "freedom from the interference of others in doing whatever it is you wish to dO.,,96 Defined so broadly, Dworkin agrees that liberty will be bound to conflict with equality for example, over taxation and welfare. l do not think that this definition does justice to the complexity of Berlin's concept of 'negative' liberty, and certainly it leaves aside the issue of positive liberty, but let that ride for the moment. Dworkin argues, however, that it will not be true on his own definition, which adds the following rider to Berlin's definition - " ... as long as you respect the moral rights, properly understood, of others." On Dworkin's definition the rich, for example, cannot claim their freedom is infringed by reasonable taxation "because the property taken from them in taxes is not rightfully theirs" - it belongs to the 'moral rights, properly understood, of others.' In other words, Berlin's definition leads to a plausible descriptive condition of pluralism while Dworkin's does not. The question then, is what standard ofliberty should be applied? Dworkin suggests that the two definitions of liberty should be tested against basic moral intuitions, and offers the following test case: "Suppose l want to murder my critics.,,97 He then argues that, on Berlin's definition ofliberty, ifhe is prevented from so doing, then his liberty is invaded, while on his own it is not. The crucial question is whether our intuitions suggest that we or the "state should feel remorse" in hindering Dworkin's desired action. 98 Ifwe should feel remorse then there has been a real violation of liberty, and this would affirm the consistency of Berlin' s definition with our intuitions. If there is no reason for remorse, then Berlin' s definition will seem erroneous, and we should accept Dworkin's definition which denies that preventing him from murdering his critics is a violation of liberty since the action would violate the rider of the definition - it would not respect the moral rights, properly understood, of others. Dworkin concludes that most everyone will agree that there is no reason for remorse, and by consequence that Berlin's definition of liberty is faulty, and should be replaced by his own, in which case the kinds of tragic clashes which Berlin sees arising in the paradigm case of liberty and equality would be largely vitiated. 99 l want to raise two immediate difficulties with this argument. In the first place, l suggest that the way that Dworkin frames the argument in terms of Berlin's view of

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moral or political choices overlooks important distinctions in Berlin's thought. In the second place, the manner in which he construes his own example leaves key features unexplored. When these factors are taken into account l will argue that a good case can be made that Berlin's definition of liberty does better justice to our basic intuitions than does Dworkin's. This would then takes us back to the initial condition of apparent pluralism. In the first place, l want to suggest that Dworkin conflates different types of political choices which arise in Berlin's thought, specifically tragic choices (which entail doing irremediable harm), radical choices more generally (which often involve what could be described as doing a wrong), and moral and political choices which are neither radical nor tragic (which characteristically involve loss, but no necessary wrong or harm). l do not think that it is generally true that Berlin maintains that the constraint of any aspect of liberty (here negative), or any other value, must always be a subject for social remorse, or must produce an irredeemable moral stain. This is particularly true where the constraint of a value is undertaken to secure a greater amount of the same value, or when the suppression is clearly rational and explicable - that is, where there alternatives are commensurable and weighted to one side. In these cases, what Berlin's thought suggests should be recognized is that there may be a real loss. Loss, as the epigram of this chapter suggests, is characteristic of the real conflict of values. Berlin, l will argue, could make a good case that our intuitions do suggest that there is often a loss of liberty in respecting the moral rights of others properly understood. Dworkin's definition denies this. Now, the choice that Dworkin raises - whether to stop him from murdering his critics or not - does not look like a tragic choice, with attendant harm and remorse, or even a radical choice, necessitating a wrong, which helps to explain why, as Dworkin acknowledges, "everyone agrees that l must be stopped;" even "those who defend Berlin's definition" will say that the invasion ofhis liberty "is justified." Dworkin encourages the sense that there is something radical in the problem by characterizing the question as one in which "liberty is in conflict with other values and those other values must prevail."IOO Framing the question as one between liberty as exclusively on one side, and in contention with a range of other values on the other, suggests both a degree of incommensurability and that this question provides a clear test of liberty. It is not

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obvious however that question is so clear-cut. Surely the liberty of Dworkin's critics must also be weighed into the equation of whether or not to stop him. Killing them for writing uncomplimentary things about him would certainly seem to infringe their "freedom from the interference of others in doing whatever it is they wish to do." Indeed, in-so-far as Dworkin has many critics, a lot of freedom would be infringed. We might even talk about a chilling effect on everyone's freedom to criticize safely, induding Dworkin's. The question is not simply one about freedom being overridden by other values, but also offavoring more freedom, which for Berlin is an end-in-itself. My point is to stress that it does not appear that the question ofwhether to stop Dworkin's killing spree or not is incommensurable at aIl. If there is no incommensurability then it cannot be a radical or a tragic choice, in which case there is no need for remorse except in the general sense that we cannot always have everything, a recognition of loss. As Williams stresses, not every failure to recognize a value daim constitutes a "wrong" done against someone. 11 The absence of remorse need not discredit the idea of freedom. What Berlin's definition offreedom does show, which Dworkin's does not, is that there is a real constraint of freedom in Dworkin being stopped from killing people, whether or not this can be amply justified. Berlin could argue with a good deal of plausibility that people will generally recognize that there is sorne loss of freedom even in being prevented from doing something bad, and therefore that his definition cornes doser to the meaning of the term than Dworkin's does. Ifwe are told that we must respect others' property, or that we must not slander them, or defraud them, these proscriptions may aIl be connected with respecting their moral rights, properly understood. These may aU be weU-justified mIes and yet there remains a sense in which they are, in Berlin's estimate, recognizable constraints on our liberty, however well-sanctioned. Dworkin's definition, depending on how others' moral rights are worked out, will have difficulty recognizing that there is any such restraint of liberty. Perhaps the best illustration is offered by Dworkin himseIf. His paradigm case is, as we have seen, having to tax the rich heavily to redistribute income to a large body of poor citizens. If the rich who are being taxed complain that their liberty is being constrained, Berlin might respond, as Bernard Williams has it "You are right - there was a cost in liberty, but no one can have everything. The democratically elected government

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is advancing equality and social justice, and those values may well be advanced by this, but there is a cost in liberty."lo2 On Dworkin's reading, however, there is no necessity of choice because liberty does not come properly into play, at least as far as redistribution can be couched in terms of the moral rights of others. He wants to say to the rich, when they complain, " ... that they are wrong about what liberty is, and that on the better conception, taxation does not compromise liberty at all."I03 This, he feels, should be said even if" ... we know that their view of liberty has an important pedigree, that their opinion is not stupid or contemptible." Berlin may protest at this point - if! am subject to a sudden and enormous increase in my tax burden which is required by the purported moral rights of others, and am by consequence prevented from sending my children to college, or retiring, or going on vacation, is my freedom not constrained? Moreover, what gives someone else the moral authority to dictate to me what my freedom consists in, even when my opinion is plausible, and carries an important 'historical pedigree'? Berlin would suggest, 1think, that in denying authoritatively that these represent real limitations on freedom, Dworkin's definition ofliberty, however useful from the perspective of rational choice or social utility, seems eccentric in terms of actual use and understanding. Unlike Dworkin, however, Berlin would be unlikely to simply rule the alternative out. His counter-argument would likely take the form of trying to show that there is a conflation of liberty and justice embedded in Dworkin's definition which confuses the nature ofliberty. There is also likely sorne underlying monist presumption from which it derives its assertive authority which may not seem very plausible once drawn out into the open. As we will see in a moment this turns out to be the case. For these reasons 1 do not think that Dworkin's argument against Berlin's understanding of freedom (in-so-far as it is his understanding) are particularly telling. If, however, Berlin's understanding ofliberty cannot be read out from the beginning, then it can plausibly offer a basis for understanding the clash of values in the case of taxation and income redistribution, and we can then, in Dworkin's own estimate, expect to see, deep collisions and clashes ofthese values over particular questions. This would mean accepting at least the initial plausibility of a pluralist descriptive account of moral life. Now, with the plausibility of Berlin's account of (negative) liberty somewhat secured, the tables can be turned and the plausibility of Dworkin's own definition

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challenged. This challenge begins with three quick observations, which will lead into three arguments of recognizably Berlinian style, which finally return to the issue of pluralism and monism. First, Dworkin does not seem to think that there is a general underlying understanding of liberty which can provide an exclusive foundation for the authority ofhis definition: "we don't already have a settled conviction ofliberty.,,104 Second, the question that naturally arises then is how is Dworkin is so certain that the rich people, or Berlin, 'are wrong about what liberty is.' The answer is precisely the monist presupposition that we had Berlin suspecting earlier:
It seems to me that integrity among our concepts is itself a value, so that we have that standing reason for seeking out, for preferring, conceptions of our values that do not conflict. 105

Here Dworkin embraces what Berlin sees as the monist presupposition - unified theories are better. A system of values which do not conflict, but are somehow dovetailing or compossible represent one of the specific forms of monism that Berlin critiques. Dworkin's notion here that monism itselfrepresents a value stands in sharp contrast to Berlin's insistence on pluralism as a value. Moreover, it provides a compelling explanation ofwhy Dworkin thinks that Berlin's view ofliberty does not match up with our moral convictions. Dworkin's definition ofliberty, on the other hand, is attractive at least in part by virtue of the fact that it permits a monistic structure of values. l return to this stark contrast in the third objection to Dworkin's position below. Third, Dworkin not only introduces the criteria of integrity, unity and monism into his political thought, but at the same time he severs his moral thought in large degree from historical thought, in sharp contrast with Berlin: We're trying to decide how better to understand the value of liberty - a value to which we take ourselves to be committed.... l see no substitute for treating that, at least in the main, as a moral rather than an historical issue. 106 l don't quite see how history can be decisive at this point in our argument. 107 Berlin's rejoinder here would seem to he that history is crucial to self-understanding of our moral and political values and, in Dworkin's language, intuitions. The key point to which l want to draw attention is that in the absence of a strong historical component in Dworkin's moral and political philosophy makes it a very abstract inquiry in which the imperative towards achieving a frictionless unity assumes a disproportionate weight.

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With these features on the table, three main critiques of Dworkin's understanding of liberty can be suggested. In the first place, Thomas Nagel puts his finger on a dubious component of Dworkin's formulation ofliberty when he declares, I am somewhat skeptical about Dworkin's proposaI to solve this problem by introducing the conception of liberty as doing what you like with what is rightfully yours, because I think the problem will just rise again. That is, the conflict between the values of liberty and equality will arise again in your answer to the question, 'what is rightfully yours?' 108 In other words, Nagel places the burden on Dworkin's argument offraming the moral rights of others, properly understood, in such a way that they do not themselves raise pluralistic conflicts, particularly those concerning liberty and equality which it was specifically framed to avoid. To return to Dworkin's example, why is it not open to the rich to dispute what the moral rights of others consists in? Equally, the poor may argue that such rights are construed too thinly. Moreover, divergences on the question of moral rights, 'properly understood,' need not be directed by self-interest, but may quite understandably differ according to diverse basic models of moral and politicallife, so that a Christian may disagree with a Marxist. The point here is that Dworkin is unwarranted in assuming that his own definition diminishes pluralist contestation unless he can show, at least in his preferred example, that moral contestation is actually reduced by the addition of his rider rather than merely displaced. Bernard Williams raises a second important challenge to Dworkin's definition of liberty, as failing to attend to the historical development and 'contour' of the concept as it 109 He argues that it is implausible to has developed and is today understood and used. adopt a definition simply in light of the demands of abstract moral theory, or because it is convenient - that sorne definition, for example, generates fewer conflicts than alternatives: ... the concerns which basically go with these various values cannot be redirected simply nominalistically, by redefining a word .... The significant point is that you cannot necessarily get the basic concerns that go with those values to fol1ow these systematic proposaIs, because the concern with the value is ... mediated by history.JIO Dworkin admits that it may be impossible to find values both plausible and compossible. If it is impossible to achieve both objectives, he allows that we must "concede conflict."JJJ Still, he insists that "We haven't yet been given reason to abandon hope.,,112
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He thinks that we still have "a pretty good shot" at formulating values which accord adequately with our reflective convictions and also fit within a unified system of moral values. 113 Williams suggests, in the spirit of Berlin, that Dworkin's optimism stems at least in part from accepting a standard of adequate rather than best accordance, and correspondingly abstracting values from their historical development and underlying basic models, and finally presuming they are independently adjustable at will. Williams argues that this strategy is unrealistically abstract. Gray aptly articulates this objection: T0 do political philosophy as if it were an accident that human beings have histories, as do recent Kantian liberals such as Rawls and Dworkin ... is to make ciphers - not human beings, whose very essence is historical - its subject matter. For Berlin as for communitarians this is a grievous error. 114 Williams argues that the manner in which values are best understood to have historically developed in our own time, even in their basic contours, renders the monist endeavor both futile and conceptually incoherent. 115 Dworkin is correct of course to argue that Berlin does not demonstrate this position with any final certainty. If the moderate historicist reading is correct, Berlin is well-aware that he cannot and does not try. Dworkin's failure, however, to invalidate Berlin's view of negative liberty and replace it with his own seems, if anything, to attest to the irreducible diversity of formulations of moral value. Berlin's position, firmly grounded in historical interpretation, remains strongly plausible. Berlin lays a number of accusations at the door of monism, but perhaps the most significant among them is that it is intolerant of, and insensitive to, rational diversity. This concern seems accurately reflected in Dworkin's insistence that a frictionless liberty is simply better, and that alternative c1aims which fail to match up on this criterion can be dismissed as mistakes as to the nature of liberty. Berlin may then respond that he thinks Dworkin's criterion uncompelling, and that he does think pluralism is a preferable condition to monism. He may then offer his historical, conceptual, prudential, and normative arguments against monism and for pluralism. Dworkin must then respond that the integrity of ethical systems of values must outweigh these other considerations. To sustain this position, however, Dworkin would have to show that unity is overwhelmingly valuable in sorne way that discredits pluralism as a plausible or reasonable value. This he does not offer to do. Berlin may thus conc1ude that the case validates his concerns about
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monism - that it produces an unjustified certainty which leads to dismissal of legitimate dissent, and that it is itself seemingly without adequate foundation. Moreover, however weIl intentioned Dworkin's 'moral rights of others' are, once these are accepted in principle as defining the range of freedom, aIl that is required is to extend their range to reduce the effective range of freedom, while at the same time it is possible to say that there is no diminution of freedom at aIl, and anyone who disagrees does not know what freedom is. Taken as a historicist best interpretation, Berlin's pluralism seems not only to survive the monist rejoinder as reasonable view, but at least in sorne respects also as a more attractive one, and indeed appears to be to sorne extent validated by it.

S.v The Hermeneutic Critique

Berlin's thought has also been importantly criticized from what can be described as the other side: not from a monist orientation but from the perspective of the need for more open and unconstrained dialogue. 116 Where Dworkin charges Berlin with placing too much emphasis on diversity, other critics, such as Charles Blattberg, have argued that Berlin and other pluralists do not go far enough in coming to terms with the deep diversity of contemporary morallife. In this respect, Blattberg argues, while pluralism such as Berlin's does mark an important advance over what he describes as neutralist liberal positions (here he refers to Rawls, Dworkin, and others), it nevertheless falls short of what he describes as hermeneutic, or elsewhere patriotic, political thought. 117 The essence of Blattberg's critique is that the sort of range of equally ultimate objective values which form Berlin's unstable equilibrium constitute a theoretical imposition on politics that is inadequately flexible to sustain truly 'morally sensitive' dialogue, mutual recognition, the possibility of reconciling diversity through a fusion of horizons, and consequently of achieving moral and political progress. If politics consists, as he suggests, "in responding to conflict with dialogue," 118 and Berlin's pluralism constrains discourse so as to interfere with conflict resolution in a way that other approaches do not, then Berlin's is an inferior understanding ofpolitics. Indeed, Blattberg suggests that the idea of a range of equally ultimate values leaves us with a conception of politics as a 'zero-sum game,' where endorsement of one value leads to a cost in another, and hence the 'dirty hands' of continuaI compromise, tradeoffs and justified injustice. 119 It equally reflects atomistic assumptions about the nature of values which seem, at best,

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problematic. 120 Blattberg advocates dropping any general and objective account of the ultimate values per se, and instead encouraging a reliance on context, "moral sensitivity," and an unconstrained political dialogue which allows that values may not only have different weights in different particular cases, but also "significantly different meaning." 121 While Berlin, 1 suspect, might weIl be very sympathetic to Blattberg's construal of politics as discourse with an emphasis on conflict resolution, the challenge as thus framed again goes to the heart ofhis political thought, denying the basic descriptive claim of a range of objectively perceptible moral values. Where Dworkin saw Berlin's construction of values as too diverse, Blattberg sees it as too constraining, as unable to recognize significantly different meanings. Nonetheless, like Dworkin, Blattberg purports to see greater opportunities for reconciliation in the field of values, albeit not through abstract moral theory but through practical engagement. The principal difficulty with Blattberg's critique, at least on a moderate historicist reading of Berlin, is that it misconstrues Berlin's account of objective values as a theoretical imposition rather than an interpretive account, and crucially under-represents the discursive resources and flexibility of Berlin's thought. Once these resources are better appreciated, it is by no means clear that hermeneutics do represent a better and more promising approach to political discourse or that the opportunities for reconciliation they purport to offer come without costs - indeed, 1 will suggest that there are good reasons to suspect the opposite. While Blattberg' s argument may wield a great deal of force against pluralists in general, 1will argue that its core elements do not impact so greatly on Berlin (on the moderate historicist reading). The essence of this argument is that while sorne of Berlin' s substantial political commitments (such as the range of equally ultimate values) are distinctively pluralist, his thought shares far more in common with hermeneuticists than Blattberg's discussion would seem to allow. This point assumes particular importance to Blattberg's argument because he sees Berlin as an especial1y representative case of the pluralist position. 122 The main through-line of Blattberg's critique involves the appeal to objective values as isolated and ahistorical objects:

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And yet, for pluralists, there also exists a thin, universalistic, de-contextualized dimension, one in which the core meanings of those values are present in isolated and 'pure' and 'uncontaminated' forms. This is where we are to find a value's fixed, and so essentially ahistorical, 'soul' or 'skeleton', it being this that is said to be 'fleshed out' when the value is present with others in a given thick context. 123 Elsewhere he talks ofthese core meanings as the 'shell' or 'skeleton' of objective values. 124 In Blattberg's estimate, these objective shells represent a theoretical imposition on the thick context of politics which constrains openness and moral sensitivity to diverse meanings. Since pluralists hold these values to be distinct, isolated, and incompatible, they set up the zero-sum game wherein compromise is the best outcome: "11 is the pluralist assertion of the existence ofthis thin dimension ofmeaning that limits change to that of compromise in thick politics.,,125 Hermeneuticists or patriots, by contrast, refrain from drawing on a theoretical superstructure in thick politics and take a more holistic approach to meaning which allows far greater potential to move beyond compromise to substantial reconciliation. Now, the first thing that needs to be observed is that Berlin's framework of values is hardly fixed, ahistorical or universalistic. It is, for example, open-ended to allow for the appearance of new values, and allows for the transpositions of old ones. Nonetheless, it is certainly true that Berlin wants to keep objective values distinct in the meantime: "liberty is liberty, not equality or fairness ....,,126 He lays great and repeated emphasis on the dangers of integrating and conflating these values. 127 The key point here is that the shell meanings that he attributes to these values, and which sustain their distinctness, are not drawn from any abstract and deductive ahistorical, universalistic theory and imposed on the thick context of politicallife, but rather represent his best interpretation of the thick context. In other words, his point is that people do actually generally hold objective values as distinct. As an interpretation rather than a theoretical deduction this assessment does not seem to be without plausibility. As Bernard Williams observes, most people do think ofjustice and liberty and equality as distinct values placing different demands on 128 Indeed, even the hermeneuticists on Blattberg's analysis recognize a degree of US. distinctness among values: they hold only "that goods are at all times somewhat integrated with each other;,,129 moreover, interpretive wholes continue to exhibit "regions in tension" where values threaten to diverge. 130 Now, on the hermeneuticist

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view such values are continually being re-articulated and reconciled, but this process, as Blattberg allows, characteristically opens up tensions elsewhere, so that people are engaged in a "never-ending struggle for a unity of self." 131 In this light, Berlin' s interpretation of the contemporary form of life seems really to differ in degree from that of the hermeneuticists: he holds that people do recognize a deeper diversity and potential for irreconcilability among values than hermeneuticists, and that people are willing to tolerate the moral tensions that these differences imply to a greater degree than hermeneuticists. He suggests that this diversity only becomes a problem when particular conflicts arise between values in particular cases. If the difference between Berlin and Blattberg's hermeneuticists is seen in this way, as suggested by the moderate historicist reading, not as one offoundational framework but of substantial interpretation, then it becomes possible to perceive further similarities; for example, while Berlin does perceive values as distinct, he does nonetheless apply a very holistic approach to their interpretation in general: he writes, Values are not isolated. They are ... connected with other values which between them form a constellation, a way oflife. 132 the purposes we seek to realize should be seen as elements in a total form of life, which can be enhanced or damaged by decisions .... total forms oflife must be compared directly as wholes 133 The crucial difference is that on his interpretation, these wholes can sustain a greater degree of diversity than on Blattberg's view, wherein they continually struggle for unity. Moreover, there is reason to be concerned about the sharp distinction that Blattberg wants to draw between pluralists appealing to the universal, ahistorical, absolute meaning of a value and hermeneuticists as allowing that meaning can be flexible. While Berlin does appeal to the kernel of common understanding in a value, he nevertheless allows that different groups, individuals and cultures may invest this kernel with very different meanings, so that the meanings may be radically dissimilar and may even clash radically. Both positive and negative liberty represent valid interpretations of the basic concept, although their substantial meanings and entailments are sharply different - indeed, Berlin refers in the opening section of "Two Concepts of Liberty" to over 200 possible interpretations of liberty. 134 Even within these diverse categories,

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Berlin discusses a variety of sub-concepts and alternative formulations. The constraint that such kernels ofmeaning impose on discourse seems far less onerous than Blattberg's discussion suggests. In addition, contrary to Blattberg's suggestion regarding pluralists' predilection towards the universal, ahistorical and stable meaning ofvalue-shells, Berlin definitely allows that these values, can be radically transformed over time, particularly political values. The transposition of basic values is the essence of the Berlin's heroic conception of philosophy. Moreover, he points to the specifie transposition of a number of values, such as liberty, which evolved from an exclusively positive sense to a divided value. Finally, returning to Blattberg's central contention, it is again unclear how much force this argument really exercises against Berlin. Blattberg's point is that the presumptive or theoretical value-atomism of pluralists constrains their understanding of political discourse to the forming of compromises and trade-offs, whereas the valueholism ofhermeneuticists allows them to think in terms ofreconciliation and progress in morallife and self-understanding. It is certainly true that in Berlin's view compromise is essential. The important question, however, is whether in his view political discourse is limited to the pursuit of compromise. 1 suggest that this is clearly not the case. Berlin argues that in sorne cases where ultimate values remain stubbornly incompatible and incommensurable, and therefore rationally irresolvable, they will demand a degree of compromise. However, many apparent clashes and collisions will not be so characterized. Many will, through dialogue, reveal commensurability and/or compatibility, so that they can be reconciled harmoniously, or at least evaded. There is always also the possibility that the dispute will give rise to transpositions of values which could resolve sorne questions, while perhaps opening others. On the other hand, there are also sorne limits to compromise. Where moral dilemmas are "acute," where minimum thresholds of ultimate values are unconvincingly challenged, where a group or individual appeal to values that we cannot understand, "there can be no question oftradeoffs.,,135 Compromise, in essence, is not the only outcome of the clash of values - for Berlin political dispute it is not always a zero-sum game. My point here in defending Berlin against Blattberg's critique of pluralists is that whatever he may demonstrate about pluralists in general, Blattberg does not show that the

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sort of range of equally ultimate objective values which form Berlin's unstable equilibrium is either illegitimately assumed or deduced, or is inadequately flexible to sustain truly morally sensitive dialogue, mutual recognition and the possibility of reconciling diversity. The challenge which confronts Blattberg, at least in critiquing Berlin, is to show in practice how the value 'shells' interpretively attributed to objective values, such as equality, for example, as 'everyone counting for one,' at least as a default position, actually work to constrain the possibilities for reconciliation in contemporary politics, and that such failure actually constitutes a significant loss. This is not yet evident. ln offering this defense 1 do not want to imply that there are no relevant differences between Berlin and hermeneuticists as presented by Blattberg. Blattberg does develop several important and convincing distinctions - particularly conceming the operation of the imagination and the interrelation of values - but 1do not think that they are adequate to establish his main line of argument. Indeed, 1would suggest that they provide sorne fodder for a Berlinian counter-critique to his c1aim of the superiority of hermeneuticist to pluralist political thought. 136 To raise just one representative example, Blattberg charges that pluralists have to take political c1aims, 'what people want,' at face value, and thus are reliant on 'goodfaith' negotiation and vulnerable to strategic negotiation strategies, and that this represents a weakness of pluralist positions like Berlin' s. This is certainly a fair point, but it could also be argued to apply to hermeneuticists in greater measure than pluralists. Pluralists at least have a 100 se framework of value shells to work from. Hermeneuticists, with their focus on flexible meaning, unconstrained discourse, moral sensitivity and fusions of horizons seem to have no defense against 'bad-faith' negotiations and bogus po 1 1 cl' It1ca mms. 137 ln SUffi then, Blattberg's case that pluralism is inadequately sensitive to politics as discourse, fails ta score decisive points against Berlin at least. For Berlin, politics is not necessarily a zero-sum game. Moreover, a careful examination of the features of Berlin's thought casts doubt on the generality of a number ofhis key distinctions between pluralists and hermeneuticists. Berlin's position again emerges as plausible and

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reasonable, and at least arguably more attractive than the alternative in sorne important respects.

S.vi The Charge of Relativism

In the last section, 1 argued that there are no strictly universal claims or foundations in Berlin's thought. 1 also suggested in Chapter 2 that despite Berlin's continuaI criticism of monist presumptions, they have informed a great deal of criticism ofhis work. From the perspective of a monist presumption, if there is not one solid and enduring truth which orients Berlin's work, then there must be no foundation at all; in other words, if my claim of no strict absolutes is accurate, then Berlin must be a relativist. This is an accusation that Berlin denies almost as often as he criticizes the monist presumption which drives it. 138 1 will argue that Berlin's denials are compelling. In order to appreciate why Berlin's denials are compelling, it will be helpful to refresh the accusation. The logic of relativism is simple. There is no objective correlate 139 Moral and political perspectives, towards which our opinions or values are directed. and their consequent claims, are ultimately matters of taste, immune to rational contestation. These divergent tastes constitute worlds which are characteristically closed and impermeable to one another - so "1 prefer coffee, you prefer champagne. We have different tastes. There is no more to be said.,,140 Communication, understanding, and judgments between moral and political worlds are purely superficial - they cannot penetrate to the truth of different moral or political worlds. Berlin replies to one such accusation, "'This would entail a wild anarchism in which, 1 confess, 1 cannot recognize myself.,,141 "My view is very different: it is what Kocis correctly calls pluralism, to be carefully distinguished from relativism or subjectivism.,,142 Berlin advances sorne fairly typical arguments against relativism. 1. "it ill accords with its absolutist premise" - its own universal claim is undermined by its own rejection of universal truths; it is self-contradictory. Relativism relativizes itself. 143 2. "it opens the door to the war of aU against all" - since it des pairs of communication and persuasion, it leads to a reliance on force. 3. it ill accords with human experience - we are too familiar with cases of authentic understanding and communication between different worlds as well as the possibility of argument and j udgment between competing models, to find this position very ' compe Il mg,. 144 4. relativism is implausibly monistic - it asserts a single, dominant moral and
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political truth. These arguments re-affirm Berlin's hostility to relativism, but however compelling they may be, they do not yet show that Berlin's thought does not lapse, however inadvertently, into it nonetheless. How then does Berlin's thought resist a degeneration into relativism? Berlin does not, as we have seen, deny the possibility of an objective correlative, although he did allow that there may be important limitations to our capacity to fully grasp it with certainty. This does not mean, however, that we need be wholly helpless in this regard - that we cannot give more and less compelling accounts of ourselves and the world. Moreover, Berlin does not deny the possibility of any communication or understanding or even judgment between basic models, or cultures, or civilizations. Berlin's idea ofthe sympathetic imagination, as we have seen, claims a capacity to reconstruct diverse orientations so that real insight can be gained into foreign, even quite distant, moral worlds. This implies that cultural wOrlds and diverse outlooks within forms of life are not closed books to one another. There is always room for communication, understanding, and persuasion. This consideration of the power of the imagination alone may be enough to show that Berlin is not a strict relativist.
145

He does

not accept that where there is a fundamental difference of outlook there is nothing more to say, or that moral worlds are closed to one another. Berlin does not treat aIl values or claims as equal, particularly within the common form of life. He defends a descriptive view of human nature which he thinks does better justice to our common moral experience than alternatives. He further defends a limited although open-ended range of equally ultimate values. Moreover, he makes strong arguments about the comparative force of different views of human nature and corresponding values. Probably the most obvious ofthese is Berlin's attack on monism. He is clearly by no means saying that pluralism and monism are irresolvable matters of taste. Moreover, he challenges basic models and values which he believes rely on "empirically false beliefs," or which are internally incoherent in terms of their own recognizable frames of reasoning. He is also interested in challenging views which calI for a fundamental transposition of values or outlook, but which are unable to provide any adequate warrant for this demand. Finally, he rejects many beliefs that are simply beyond the pale of what we are capable of understanding, or with which we cannot communicate:
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Thus, if 1 say of someone that he is kind or cruel, loves truth or is indifferent to it, he remains human in either case. But if 1 find a man to whom it literally makes no difference whether he kicks a pebble or kills his family, since either would be an antidote to ennui or inactivity, 1 shall not be disposed, like consistent relativists, to attribute to him merely a code of morality different from my own or that of most men, or declare that we disagree on essentials, but shall begin to speak of insanity and inhumanity; 1 shall be inclined to consider him mad, as a man who thinks he is Napoleon is mad; which is a way of saying that 1 do not regard such a being as being fully a man at aIl. 146 The horizon of recognizable values and ideals marks the limit of reasonable discourse, as weIl as the limit of the recognizably human. Unlike the consistent relativist, Berlin insists that sorne actions, assertions, and beliefs can, after ample attempts at understanding, ultimately be recognized as not simply different, but mad and inhuman. At a more generallevel of what is sometimes called cultural relativism - the claim that values are culturally or historically intransitive or impermeable - Berlin's thought points to quasi-universal human values shared by the great majority of human cultures at most times, including what appear to be objective values. It has been forcefully argued by many ofhis interpreters that these quasi-universals set up a loose and tentative set of minimal moral quasi-universals. Of course one can give excellent reasons (this is what 1regard as 'being rational') - to take Hume's famous example - for rejecting an act that would destroy the universe in order to end the pain in my little finger. These reasons would be based both in empirical knowledge and moral convictions shared with the great majority of mankind. 1 can give equally good reasons for refusing to take someone's life rather than adding to my own comfort, or choosing to resist those who are bent on the destruction of my family, my friends, my country, rather than 147 seeking my own personal safety and so on. Berlin' s point seems to be here that in virtually any context known to us, the argument that it is better to destroy the universe rather than suffer a pain in my finger will have recourse to a view of human nature that is, on inspection, even on its own account, implausible, and can be shown to be so according to resources available within its own framework, and in relation to empirical knowledge ofmankind more generally. That is perhaps why one never rarely sees such arguments being attempted. They collapse because they cannot appeal to any adequate grounds, any plausible account of themselves, regardless of basic model or forms of life.

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Berlin's critical insight into the problem of cultural relativism is that even the perpetrators of great historical crimes and the practitioners of brutal oppression embrace at least sorne categories and values which are similar to our own, at least in relation to themselves. They desire to be free in either a positive or negative sense, they seek happiness, perhaps even membership, they believe that they are in sorne sense moral agents, capable of reason, and, perhaps more importantly, they associate these traits with fully-fledged, self-aware human beings in general. They are therefore within our capacity to comprehend. They are, moreover, generally not mad, but rational in terms of their own (often "appallingly false") beliefs. The critical question for them then is who is and who is not a fully-fledged, self-aware human being. The Nazis defined Jews, for example, as Untermenschen, so that the qualities that inhere in full human beings do not extend to them, just as sorne vulgar Marxists defined many people as victims of an irremovable false-consciousness which made them unaware of their own true interests and thus rendered them the unhappy but unavoidable victims ofhistory. Aristotle's treatment of slaves and women as constitutionally incapable of rational self-direction fits in the same boat. Berlin's point is that we need not appeal to any absolute morallaws in order to judge these daims harshly. Upon careful inspection, they rely, in Charles Taylor's words, on "special pleadings" which they cannot bear Up.148 Aristotle's evidence on this point is notoriously flimsy and unequal to the rigor of his own moral thought in general. The Soviet position is grounded on a vulgar reading of Marx, and beyond that on what Berlin argues is a totally unwarranted historical materialism - which indeed he stresses history has, at any rate, proved false. 149 The Nazi position appeals to an empirically false view of Jews as sub-human perverters ofhealthy culture. For Berlin, none ofthese special pleadings stand up to any critical scrutiny. In light of the bloody crimes carried out in the name of these self-serving falsehoods and distortions, we need have no particular difficulty in assigning moral blame. lso While this argument does not rely on absolute and universal morallaw, it is obvious that it is at least equidistant from any acceptance that cultural values are simply matters of taste, and that there is nothing to be said beyond that. Both Berlin's internaI and external pluralism then remain sharply distinct from relativism. Berlin does, however, hold at least this in common with relativists. He

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allows that not aIl philosophical problems will necessarily be adjudicable. Sometimes competing political claims or commitments may be similarly integral to their distinctive models or cultures or civilizations - indeed, sometimes they may rise to similar ultimacy for an individual. They may therefore resist rational resolution. In sorne such cases, acceptable compromises may be possible. In sorne cases, however, they may not. Berlin does then allow that in sorne particular cases, the kind of ultimate conflicts - or what he calls 'radical' or 'tragic' choices - with which relativists are overridingly concerned may occur. The essential difference is that for Berlin, this need by no means be the case. It will occur in only a sub-set of particular philosophical problems. Such problems must be thoroughly investigated and understood before we are warranted in drawing such a conclusion. For relativists, this is not the case. Even for what might be termed moderate relativists, who are willing to allow sorne exceptions, rational irresolvability will remain the default position. This is a premise that Berlin will not accept, and has adequate reasons to reject. Berlin's position on a moderate historicist reading does demonstrate the necessary backbone to avoid a degeneration into relativism. It emerges again as a reasonable, and potentially persuasive alternative.
S.vi Conclusion

This chapter concentrated on illuminating and defending the linkage between moderate historicism and Berlin's moral and political pluralism through a contextual conception of human nature. It focused first on filling in the general content of Berlin's concept of human nature and then connecting this concept with his variant of strong pluralism. It then showed that this formulation of pluralism could hold its own against seminal examples ofthree of the most important critiques consistently deployed against Berlin's work, each coming from a very different angle - the monist rejoinder, the hermeneutic critique, and the relativist critique. 1 argued that Berlin's pluralistic vision of political life survived each critique intact, maintaining its claim to form a reasonable and plausible account of the contemporary Western moral and politicallife, and indeed suggested that it carried ample resources to launch potent counter-critiques. Dworkin's monist rejoinder failed in its central task of discrediting Berlin's formulation ofliberty. Indeed, 1argued that Dworkin's own examples suggested that Berlin's concept of liberty exhibited strengths missing on his own definition. As a result,

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l suggest that Berlin's definition remains plausible, with the consequence that Dworkin's own conclusion of the likelihood of conflict on such an understanding of liberty also remains plausible. Berlin does not, as Dworkin argued, fail to sustain his interpretation of contemporary moral and politicallife as informed by a range of objective but rivalrous values even on his paradigm case of liberty and equality. Blattberg's hermeneuticist account failed to show that Berlin's framing of politicallife in terms of an agitated equilibrium of equally ultimate objective values was substantially disadvantaged in comparison with hermeneuticist approaches. Berlin' s position is far closer to hermeneuticists in crucial respects than Blattberg suggested, and the differences that remained did not provide a clear basis for arguing the inferiority of Berlin's pluralist conception ofpoliticallife. Indeed, l argued that pluralism seems to line up better with basic moral intuitions (pending a substantial defense of equality as meaning something other than equality) as weIl as with sorne central features ofhuman life, such as imagination and the nature of values, and finally that hermeneutics was itself more vulnerable to sorne of the critiques Blattberg raised against pluralism than is Berlin's thought. Finally, it seems clear that Berlin's pluralist political thought as construed on the moderate historicist reading contains the necessary resources to resist the charge of relativism, both internaI and externa1. Moreover, Berlin offers a range oftelling arguments against relativism, sorne fairly standard, other more distinctive. Contrary to Galipeau's claim then, Berlin's thought does not seem bound to collapse into relativism and subjectivism if it denies naturalist attributions. It remains a distinct and reasonable alternative. AlI in aIl, the moderate historicist reading provides strong and flexible support to Berlin's loosely contoured pluralism. The crucial question that will be addressed in the first half of the next chapter is how this strong pluralism supports a form of liberalism predictably perhaps, a pluralist liberalism.

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Notes

Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 242. Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," p. Il. 3 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 163. 4 C.J. Galipeau, p. 43. 5 Norman Podhoretz, p. 34. 6 Norman Podhoretz, p. 34. 7 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 74. 8 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 90. 9 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero-Sum MoraIs," Iyyun, The Jerusalem Philosophical Quarterly, Number 47 (July 1998), p. 310. 10 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 85. 11 Isaiah Berlin, "Benjamin Disraeli, Karl Marx and the Search for Identity," in Against the Current, p. 285. 12 Isaiah Berlin, "The Purpose ofPhilosophy," in Concepts and Categories, p. Il. 13 l quoted this in the last chapter, but here l will add that Berlin endorses and defends the "equally objective validity of different sets of values for dissimilar societies and conditions," aIl (for Herder) "equally objective and knowable," in Isaiah Berlin "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 83 and p. 84. 14 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 87, and p. 84 - 5. 15 Isaiah Berlin, "Nationalism: Past Neglect and Present Power," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 581. 16 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 8 - 9; Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 314 5. 17 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390 - 1; Isaiah Berlin "Reply to Mckinney," p. 557 - 9; Isaiah Berlin, "My Intellectual Path," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 12; Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 14 - 6; Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 113. 18 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. xxi and p. 15. 19 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 73. 20 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 73. 21 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 79 - 80. 22 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 239. 23 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 79 - 80. 24 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 76.
1 Isaiah

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25

This characterization draws a great many elements together. Most ofthese features are covered in the description of human nature Berlin approvingly attributes to Mill in the epigram at the beginning ofthis paper. All of these quasi-universal elements are also cited in C.J. Galipeau, p. 167. 26 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 83. 27 This distinction between quasi-universal and relatively recent values is broadly similar to Kekes distinction between primary and secondary values, with the proviso that primary values do no attain to Kekes' standard of de-contextuality. See John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism, p. 18 - 9. 28 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 85and p. 89; Isaiah Berlin, The Roots ofRomanticism, p. 33; Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 118. 29 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 391. 30 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390. 31 Berlin and Rawls actually argue over this very point - Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 25 - 6; also see Isaiah Berlin and Stephen Lukes, "A Conversation with Isaiah Berlin," p. 118 - 9. 32 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 85; also see Berlin's essay on "Political Judgement" as an exercise in 'practical reasoning' in The Sense ofReality, especially p. 43 - 53. Much of Berlin's point here is that, as he emphasizes on p. 52, we must adjust our reasoning to the subject matter. Philosophical problems are those in which the techniques of solution are not known in advance and have to be worked out. To do so, we employ "practical wisdom, practical reason" which focuses simply on "what will 'work,' and what will not" (p. 47). This formulation allows, however, that certain very basic techniques may work in varying degrees across virtually all cases. 33 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 74. 34 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 83. 35 For example, Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 38. 36 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 38. 37 Isaiah Berlin, The Magus ofthe North: J G. Hamann and the Origins ofModern Irrationalism, p. 117 - 121. 38 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 139 - 56 and p. 164. 39 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 239 - 242; and Isaiah Berlin, "The Originality of Machiavelli," p. 312 - 25; Isaiah Berlin, "My Intellectual Path," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 14. 40 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 117 - 9. 41 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 90.; for an excellent example of Berlin's love ofhuman diversity see the reference of Vera Weizmann in Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 197. 42 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 117; also see Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 38.
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Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. III - 2. 44 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 112 - 3. 45 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15. 46 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 239 240. 47 Albert Dzur, "Value Pluralism vs. Political Liberalism," Social Theory and Practice, Volume 24, Number 3 (Fall 1998), p. 378. 48 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "The Concept of Scientific History," and "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind. 49 C.l Galipeau, p. 26. 50 Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution: A Crisis in the History of Modern Thought," in The Sense ofReality, p. 168 - 9; and Isaiah Berlin, The Roots of Romanticism,p. xiii, 2, and 5; also see Isaiah Berlin, The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," p. 196 51 It is also a topic which is obviously of great personal interest to Berlin, and one to which he constantly returns. Berlin's explorations of the subject include The Roots of Romanticism, "The Romantic Revolution: A Crisis in the History of Modern Thought," "The Counter-Enlightenment," "The Apotheosis ofthe Romantic Will: The Revolt Against the Myth of an Ideal World," as well as his works on major romantic thinkers, such as J.G. Hamann and Joseph de Maistre. In fact, Berlin worked on a major book on romanticism following his retirement from the presidency of Wolfson College, Oxford, in 1975, a book he described as his projected Magnum Opus, but which sadly he was never able to complete. (Isaiah Berlin, The Roots ofRomanticism, p. ix-xvi; Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin: A Life, p. 275 - 6; Norman Podhoretz, p. 29) As Henry Hardy suggests, the Roots ofRomanticism, offers sorne consolation in this regard; it is an edited reconstruction ofhis A.W. Mellon lectures on romanticism (which were originally broadcast on BBC in 1966 and 1967, and later rebroadcast in a number of countries). (Isaiah Berlin, Roots ofRomanticism, p. xv) The influence of romanticism is nonetheless, I would suggest, perceptible throughout his work, for example through the idea of deep pluralism, historicism, the central role of the imagination, the idea ofhuman self-creation, tragedy, and a range of other central themes, which are characteristic of romantic thought, but which are generally absent from Enlightenment and mainstream contemporary liberal thought. 52 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 141 - 7; Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution," in The Sense ofReality, p. 188 - 93; Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 159; Isaiah Berlin, "The Decline ofUtopian Ideas in the West," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 46 - 8; and Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," p. 199. 53 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 175. 54 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 141. 55 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 21. 56 Isaiah Berlin, "European Unity and its Vicissitudes," in The Crooked Timber of Humanity, p. 191. 57 Isaiah Berlin, Roots ofRomanticism, p. 138 - 49; Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution," in the Sense ofReality, p. 188 - 93; and Isaiah Berlin, "The Decline of Utopian Ideas in the West," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 46 - 8.
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Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 118. 59 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 119. 60 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 119. 61 Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution: A Crisis in the History of Modern Thought," in The Sense ofReality, p. 178. 62 Isaiah Berlin, "The Counter-Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 263. 63 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 126 - 130 64 Isaiah Berlin, "The Romantic Revolution: A Crisis in the History of Modern Thought," in The Sense ofReality, p. 185 - 19I. 65 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 116, 122 - 5. 66 Isaiah Berlin, The Romantic Revolution, p. 68 - 92. 67 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 367. 68 As in J.G. Hamann and Joseph de Maistre. 69 Isaiah Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 568. 70 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 64 - 74, especially p. 64. 71 Based on c.l. Galipeau, p. 59. 72 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. Il. 73 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 239 240. 74 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. Il. 75 Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce between the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 323 - 4. 76 Isaiah Berlin, "My Intellectual Path," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 14. 77 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Robert Kocis," p. 390. 78 Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 189. 79 Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 193. 80 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 90; Isaiah Berlin, The Roots ofRomanticism, p. 62 - 4. 81 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 103 and p. 144. 82 Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 367. 83 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. lOI. 84 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. lOI. 85 Steven Lukes, "Making Sense of Moral Conflict," in Nancy Rosenblum, ed., Liberalism and Moral Life, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989), p. 141. 86 Bernard Williams, "Introduction" to Concepts and Categories, p. xvii. 87 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 76. 88 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 90. 89 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 38.
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Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with lmiah Berlin, p. 88. 91 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 44. 92 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 81. 93 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 83. 94 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 80. 95 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 83. 96 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 84. 97 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 88. 98 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conflict?", in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 88. 99 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy ofLmiah Berlin, p. 90. 100 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 88. 101 Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 98 - 9. 102 Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 100 - 1. 103 Ronald Dworkin in "Pluralism," in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 124. 104 Ronald Dworkin in "Pluralism," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 130. 105 Ronald Dworkin in "Pluralism," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 127. 106 Ronald Dworkin in "Do Liberal Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 86. 107 Ronald Dworkin in "Do Liberal Values Conf1ict?", in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 124. 108 Thomas Nagel, "Pluralism and Coherence," in The Legacy oflsaiah Berlin, p. 108. 109 Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 91 - 5, especially p. 94. II Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 94. III Ronald Dworkin, "Pluralism," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 127. 112 Ronald Dworkin, "Do Liberal Values Conf1ict," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 90. 113 Ronald Dworkin in "Pluralism," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p. 127. 114 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 102. 115 Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofLmiah Berlin, p. 94 - 7. 116 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," Public AfJairs Quarterly, Volume 15, Number 3 (July 2001), p. 193 - 4. 117 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 193; and Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum Morais," p. 309 - 12. 118 Charles B1attberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 193. 119 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 199 - 201; and Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum MoraIs," p. 312. 120 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum Morais," p. 328 - 31. 121 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 197; and Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum Morais," p. 311. 122 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 197 - 8. 123 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 200. 124 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum Morais," p. 311. 125 Charles Blattberg, "Political Philosophies and Political Ideologies," p. 200. 126 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 197. 127 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. lviii - lix; and Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 197 and p. 231.
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Bernard Williams, "Liberalism and Loss," in The Legacy ofIsaiah Berlin, p.92. 129 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum MoraIs," p. 319. 130 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum MoraIs," p. 329. 131 Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero Sum MoraIs," p. 330. 132 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 101. 133 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Idea," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 15. 134 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 193. 135 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 106. 136 One ofthese points concerns the way that the imagination and interpretive understanding are presumed to work. (Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero-Sum MoraIs," p. 324) B1attberg apt1y points out that hermeneuticists will reject Berlin's conception of the sympathetic imagination because they h01d that "an interpreter is ... never able to bypass his or her self' and to see the world through another's eyes in the way that Berlin, following Herder and Vico, suggests is possible. On hermeneuticist views, such as Gadamer's, interpretive understanding "always involves ... a fusion of horizons," a merging of the interpretive framework of interpreter and interlocutor. (Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero-Sum MoraIs," p. 324). Berlin might weil suggest that in modern multi-cultural societies characterized by a wide spectrum of outlooks and beliefs, this kind of understanding must either involve a continuaI dizzying pattern of self-transformation or a multi-directional expansion of horizons which would quickly reproduce internally the pluralist idea of a spectrum of recognizable but distinct values. Another striking feature of Blattberg's preferred view is the implication that "Since aIl parts are said to contain the whole, and so the other parts, within them, one can look within a particular good for the meaning of the good that it is in conflict with." (Charles Blattberg, "Compromising Zero-Sum MoraIs," p. 333) In other words, when liberty and equality, for example, are in conflict, one should be able to look into one and decipher the other. This view is important to the hermeneutical claim that the goods can, by their nature, be reconciled. It is a view, however, that 1 think clashes with both moral intuition and experience, and which Berlin might point to as one of the key obstacles that a hermeneuticist approach must overcome before it can present a compelling account of morallife. 137 Ronald Beiner provides an excellent example ofthis type of charge against one of Blattberg's prime examples - Charles Taylor - in Ronald Beiner, "Hermeneutical Generosity and Social Criticism," in Philosophy in an Age ofLost Spirit (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997), p. 151 - 66. 138 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 9. 139 Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in Eighteenth Century Thought," in The Crooked Timher ofHumanity, p. 80 - 1. 140 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 9. 141 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 390. 142 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 389. 143 Isaiah Berlin, "Historical Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 171. 144 Isaiah Berlin, "Historieal Inevitability," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 179 - 180.
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Berlin himself makes this same point on behalf of Vico and Herder against charges of relativism - Isaiah Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century," in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 85 - 6. 146 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 83. 147 Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Kocis," p. 39l. 148 Charles Taylor, "Explanation and Practical Reason," in Philosophical Arguments (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995), p. 35, and p. 53 - 5. 149 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 21, also see, p. 34, 132, 150 Berlin asserts "1 think Communism is a total failure, and there are more terrible crimes on its conscience - if it exists - than on any other movement in history, even of the great religious persecutions" - Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with L'Wiah Berlin, p. 130.
145

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He [Montesquieu] was one of the few thinkers ofhis age who grasped... that the ends pursued by men were many and various and often incompatible with one another, that this leads to unavoidable collisions between civilizations, to differences between the ideals of the same community at different times, and of different communities at the same time, and to conflicts within communities, classes, groups and within individual consciousness. Furthermore, he pereeived that ... no single moral system, let alone a single moral or political goal, could provide the universal solution to all human problems at all times ... only those societies are truly free which are in a state of "agitation", unstable equilibrium; whose members are free - choose between - a variety of ends and goals. Astate might itselfbe free, that is, independent ofother states, but if it becomes frozen and suppresses opinion in the name ofno matter how sacred a principle, its citizens are not free but enslaved. 1 [ia] - Isaiah Berlin, "Montesquieu"

Chapter 6: Pluralist Liberalism and Political Liberalism 6.i Problems of Pluralism and Liberalism
The first section ofthis chapter addresses the question ofwhether Berlin's variant of strong pluralism is compatible with, or even conducive to, a strong liberalism. 1 will argue that Berlin's pluralism does conduee to a strong but distinctive pluralist liberalism. The second section of the chapter examines the question ofwhether Berlin's pluralist liberalism is compatible with John Rawls' politicalliberalism. 1 will argue that while there are important points of agreement between the two, their understandings of political liberalism and indeed political theory are ultimately incompatible and rivalrous. The former question of the relation between Berlin's pluralism and liberalism poses two sorts of problems, general and particular. A number of theorists have argued that pluralism and liberalism are incompatible at a generallevel. Gray argues, for example, that "if a strong pluralism is true, liberalism is indefensible."2 John Kekes similarly claims that "pluralism and liberalism are incompatible.") Gray argues that pluralism precludes what he regards as "the core claim of allliberai political philosophies - that a liberal regime is ideally the best or most legitimate regime for all humankind.,,4
In essence, he sees strong pluralism as incompatible with liberal universalism. Kekes

argues that pluralism precludes a different common feature of liberal thought, specifically the liberal commitment to overriding values or combinations ofvalues. Kekes defines an overriding value as one which "always overrides any other value that conflicts with it."s In both cases, liberalism is defined in terms of only one very general common feature.

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This narrow focus reflects the fact that both Gray and Kekes explicitly recognize that the liberal tradition is very diverse. Kekes indeed quotes Raz's assertion that "11 is probably true to say that no political cause, no one vision of society nor any political principle has commanded the respect of liberals in any given generation, let alone through the centuries.,,6 Nonetheless, they each isolate a feature they think common to liberals, or most liberals, and argue that it precludes pluralism and vice versa. Berlin has been shown here to reject any presumptive strict universalism and any absolute or inviolable status for even the minimum thresholds of ultimate values. The challenge Gray and Kekes pose then is whether Berlin can still embrace a viable liberalism. Here it is worth noting that Gray does elsewhere allow for the possibility of a robust historicist liberalism, and Kekes' claim that liberals are necessarily committed to overriding values has been forcefully contested, for example by Matthew Lawrence, not only for liberals in general, but also for Kekes' four preferred case studies. Lawrence argues that overriding values are "an optional commitment for liberalism.,,7 George Crowder also offers an argument in a 1994 article that pluralism is incompatible with liberalism or indeed 'any substantial political theory.,8 Crowder's argument, however, as 1 have suggested, is based on an assimilation of strong pluralism to absolute pluralism or relativism, which was forcefully critiqued on this point by Berlin and Bernard Williams. 9 Crowder, however, argues in a later article that a more nuanced strong pluralism can be compatible with at least certain types of liberalism. Indeed, Crowder concludes his latter article, in sharp contrast with the former one, with "a case for liberalism based on value pluralism itself."IO 1 will argue along a different line in this section that Berlin's strong pluralism is compatible with, and even conduces to, his pluralist liberalism, but does not determine it. As Berlin has it, "1 believe in both liberalism and pluralism, but they are not logically connected."ll If Berlin's case is compelling, it militates against the general claim of incompatibility.
Sorne critics, however, have argued not simply for the general incompatibility of

pluralism and liberalism, but for their incompatibility specifically as framed by Berlin. Erick Mack, for example, concludes his article on Berlin's 'quest for pluralist liberalism' by asserting that "whatever endorsement of liberty emerges from [Berlin' s] balancing process will almost certainly fail to qualify as liberalism.,,12 ria] Mack's central

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argument is that a pluralist who wants to "consign [negative] liberty to the moral scales" cannot really be a liberal. Already, however, Mack's hedging 'almost certainly' suggests that not allliberalisms necessarily demand the strict primacy of negative liberty. This suggestion is duly reflected in a rather different attack on Berlin's liberalism. Marshall Cohen in his "Berlin and the Liberal Tradition," condemns Berlin of being out of sympathy with modern liberalism not because he sees negative liberty merely as one among a range of equally ultimate values. On the contrary, he sees Berlin insisting that "Only negative liberty is really, literally liberty." The problem as he sees it is that " ... the main aspirations ofrecent liberalism have been for ... positive liberty .... ,,13 Here he has in mind mainly forms of welfare liberalism. He concludes that Berlin can be convicted of "insensitivity to the philosophy behind the economic attitudes of recent liberals." Behind these two obviously contradictory accounts of Berlin's liberalism lie two very different accounts of liberalism in general. One focuses on liberals' commitment to negative liberty, one on their commitment to positive liberty. This diversity within the liberal tradition itself, at least partially acknowledged in the more general discussions of liberalism and pluralism, will itselfbe a critical component of Berlin's pluralist liberalism. Gray captures this point acutely when he writes "Berlin's view seems to be ... that the liberal tradition is itself complex and indeed pluralistic in character, and accommodates many conceptions offreedom.... ,,14 In this sense, a pluralist liberalism may be advantageous in giving expression to the diversity of the liberal tradition itself. I will argue in this section that the liberal root of Berlin' s pluralist liberalism is essentially two-fold: first, it gives expression to the essential thread that binds up the liberal tradition, that negative liberty is to be recognized as an ultimate value; second, it gives similar recognition to a wide although not unlimited range of values which have also centrally animated various aspects of the liberal tradition, including justice, positive liberty (especial1y democracy), equality, toleration, and it might weIl even he argued, community, pluralism and civility, although these may be more contestable. In essence, Berlin's pluralist liberalism gives expression both to the unity and diversity of the liberal tradition. It is a historicist view, and thus not strictly universal in the style of many traditionalliberalisms, and it expresses itself, in Kekes terms, in a "defeasible" (or

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overridable) and not an overriding set of values, yet it is a liberalism nonetheless. 15 Moreover, both aspects of Berlin's pluralist liberalism are fully consonant with his formulation of strong pluralism with its range of equally ultimate values. Finally, Berlin also leaves room for ultimate values which are at least not characteristically liberal, such as truth, self-understanding, and sincerity. Berlin's recognition ofthese values illustrates that it is strong pluralism which forms the ultimate baseline ofhis thought, and explains why Berlin insists that his pluralism does not strictly determine his liberalism, although it may conduce to it.

6.ii Berlin's Pluralist Liberalism

Can Berlin be both a strong pluralist and a strong liberal? As we have seen, many critics and interpreters argue that this is an essential question that Berlin's writing fails to answer convincingly. These studies tend to focus principally on examining Berlin's pluralism, attributing to him a conventionalliberalism of one sort or another. 1 want to suggest that the key to understanding this criticallinkage in Berlin's thought lies as much in understanding his distinctive liberalism as it does in examining his pluralism. Berlin's critics often fail to appreciate how deeply the themes of historicism, pluralism and radical choice influence his liberalism. Moreover, these critical discussions of Berlin's thought frequently fail to distinguish between two quite distinct aspects of the problem - that is, on one hand, Berlin's view of Ziberalism in general (as a broad tradition or a general concept) and on the other hand, his own particular pluraZist
Ziberal vision. Pluralism and liberalism in general, on at least sorne of their variant

formulations, are certainly incompatible. As Berlin suggests, "There are liberal theories which are not pluralistic.,,16 Liberalism may be, and often has been, monistic. This does not mean, however, that it always has to be thus, or that on at least sorne legitimate constructions that liberalism and pluralism cannot be compatible. There are no doubt many forms of liberalism and pluralism, and the charge that Berlin's thought balks at the rclationship of liberalism and pluralism only has bite if pluralism and liberalism are either generally and necessarily incompatible, or alternately if the particular variants that Berlin incorporates into pluralist liberalism are incompatible. If Berlin's general and particular understandings of liberalism are not clearly distinguished, aIl sorts of confusions ensue. 17 While we can expect these general and particular ideas to be appropriately related to one

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another - for example, the particular view should be a legitimate case of the general view - we will nonetheless need to keep them distinct in order to assess the possibility of a pluralist liberalism.
18

Does Berlin then have a general concept of liberalism of which his own particular liberal pluralism is a variant? If so, what does it entail? These questions can be answered by considering Berlin' s treatment of other c1early recognized cases of liberalism. That Berlin has a general idea ofliberalism can be shown by comparing Berlin's own position with three major conventional traditions which he c1early recognizes as liberal, specifically classical, Kantian and utilitarian. Berlin criticizes each tradition and, on inspection, it will be c1ear that his own position is wholly incompatible with them. Yet he unquestionably recognizes them as liberal. Berlin must, then, have a general idea of liberalism that will encompass these distinct traditions. In-so-far as he is self-avowedly a liberal, he must, therefore, also advance a distinctive variant which falls under the general heading, and yet which is different from the other cases considered. The first tradition l will consider is c1assical liberalism. For Locke, man in the state of nature is in "a state ofperfect freedom,,,19 enjoying natural rights inhering in men as such, including rights to life, limb, freedom of action and possession. Men form a social contract in which they surrender their executive power to administer justice independently to the state so "that all men may be restrained from invading others' rights, and from doing harm to one another. ...,,20 Men thus secure the enjoyment of "life, liberty and possession" through astate created in free social compact. In effect, they secure what we might today term an extensive and protected field ofnegative liberty. If the state fails to protect natural rights, and hence the legitimate realm of private choice, citizens retain the right to abrogate this social contract. Natural rights, and the sphere of negative liberty they ensure, are embedded in human nature, and ultimately the will of God, and thus are conceived as properly supreme in politics for all human beings. Classicalliberalism generally, as Berlin describes it, is effectively centered on an overriding privilege for negative liberty in relation to competing values on political questions - as Gray has it in his Liberalism - the central feature is "the negative right to individualliberty,,,21 so that an impermeable sphere ofprivate action is assured. 22 This

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view, Berlin argues, remains profoundly influential today, particularly in terms of the basic vocabulary of concepts and values that many people bring to political problems: In the modern world we proceed on the assumption that there is a frontier between public and private life; and that, however smaU the private sphere may be, within it 1 can do as 1 please - live as 1 like, believe what 1 want, say what 1 please provided this does not interfere with the similar rights of others, or undermine the order which makes this kind of arrangement possible. This is the classicalliberal view, in whole or part expressed in various declarations of the rights of man in America and France, and the writing of men like Locke, Voltaire, Tom Paine, 23 Constant and John Stuart Mill. [ia] The state is seen primarily as a means of effectively protecting the exercise of negative liberty, protecting the realm of personal values which may be highly diverse and on sorne accounts, may even sometimes be incompatible. A minimal, regulative, 'nightwatchman state' ensures a free private life. This neatly ordered public life leaves little room for strong pluralism or radical and even tragic conflict at the level of public life. Classical liberals may or may not elaborate a rigid and comprehensive hierarchy of public goods or rights. Whether they are comprehensive or not, however, it is at least clear that negative liberty is the overriding political value which must be satisfied. It is perfectly plausible then to be a classicalliberal and a monist. Indeed, in-so-far as the classical liberal characteristicaUy places sole primacy on negative liberty, the position seems even necessarily monistic to an important degree - it sees one truth, or one compossible hierarchy of truths underlying political life. Moreover, there is nothing in the classicalliberal view which precludes liberals from extending this central claim universaUy for aU time. Indeed, it may not be too much to say that classicalliberals characteristicaUy do so - certainly Locke does. 24 Finally, there is little room in this view for concerns with radical and tragic choice, particularly on public questions. For Locke, for example, we can certainly be wrong, and we can certainly be faced with irrecoverable loss, but we cannot be confronted with two
incompatible and inadjudicable rights, between two contradictory truths, two rivalrous

ultimate commitments, at least ifwe understand political thought as he recommends. Classical liberalism comports poorly with strong pluralism. One who wishes to affirm both winds up affirming both pluralism and monism. In-so-far as classicalliberalism claims universal application, it is also inconducive to Berlin's moderate historicism.

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Berlin's own defence of negative liberty takes the form of a 'historical argument' that negative liberty has been a safer, more humane ideal than forms of monistic positive liberty. There is nothing in this argument, however, to warrant a general elevation of negative liberty over other basic values. Indeed, Berlin maintains that in spite of his own defense of negative liberty, even positive liberty retains a place among ultimate values. Strong pluralism accords equally poorly with Kant's liberalism. Similar to the case of Locke and the c1assicalliberals, individualliberty forms the transcendental, even
naumenal core of Kant's moral and political thought. In contrast to Locke and the

c1assical tradition, freedom is conceived in Kant not simply as a natural right inhering in human nature, or as a contractual obligation of the state, but as a rational dutYbinding on aIl human beings as reasoning creatures. Freedom is the necessary foundation of aIl morallife.2 5 From this Kant deduces a categorical moral and political imperative to treat human beings as ends-in-themselves, and hence to grant them basic choice in the determination of the course oftheir own lives. Human beings are free (in a positive sense) when they are rationally autonomous, that is, when they obey the categorical imperative, which entails respecting negative liberty.26 In other words, Kant offers a kind of positive, rationalistic variant of the central theme of c1assicalliberalism - negative liberty as the overriding political value - grounded in the authority ofreason. 27 Excepting the rational feature of Kant's view of freedom, Berlin affirms that his political thought shows a great deal of similarity with c1assical (or orthodox) liberalism, and that this shared focus on negative liberty continues to influence mast modem liberals: Apart from the teleological implications, this formulation does not at first appear very different from orthodox liberalism. The crucial point, however, is how to determine the criterion for the 'exact determination of the guarantee of the limits of individualliberty. Most modem liberals at their most consistent, want a situation in which as many individuals as possible can realize as many of their ends as possible, without assessment of the value of these ends as such, save in so far as they may frustrate the purposes of others?8 Berlin's phrase here, 'most modem liberals' is typical of his discussions of 'conventional liberalism'. In other places he writes of 'many' liberals or what liberals 'often' think. Clearly then, by implication, not aIlliberals need to be conventional liberals. Berlin continually reminds his readers that there are other, no less legitimate, liberalisms. He points out here that even Kant is somewhat exceptional in regard of his
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understanding of negative liberty as itself conditioned by a transcendental rationalism which restricts its legitimate expressions. On Kant's view, Berlin insists, aesthetic and other non-rational kinds of self-fulfillment may, at least in theory, be ruthlessly suppressed to make way for the demands of reason. The authority of reason and of the duties it lays upon men is identified with individual freedom, on the assumption that only rational ends can be the 'true' objects of a 'free' man's 'real' nature?9 With the rationalization of freedom, however, Kant sets in motion a train of thought that will be transmitted by the romantics to the totalitarian movements of the twentieth century, and which Berlin attacks with great vehemence, primarily in view of the transcendental certainty Kant attributes to it, and its consequent intolerance of competing claims. 30 Kant diverges from the pure form of classicalliberalism in so far as he does not treat aIl ends as similar, or morally indistinguishable, although he does share with it the strong effective political priority on 'negative' liberty in general. Moreover, Kant's construction ofliberalism is neither historicist (but universalist), nor pluralist (but monistic), nor radical or tragic (but transcendent). Like classicalliberalism, Kant's liberalism is not strictly compatible with Berlin's strong pluralism. Correspondingly, Berlin is predictably anxious to distance himself from the rationalist, teleological and transcendental aspects of Kant' s thought. 31 Now, the inheritors of classicalliberalism and the modern defenders of Kantian liberalism, need not necessarily, like Locke and Kant, claim a priori universality (grounded in nature or reason); that is, one can at least imagine a classical or Kantian liberalism that was historicist, that asserted the primacy of liberty now, for us. Such a transition may at least be possible without materially transforming the content and structure of the original theses - that is, without revamping the essential model. Lockean and Kantian liberalisms also, however, seem necessarily to exhibit a degree of monism, in-so-far as negative liberty is sharply privileged over other values by appeal to the will
of God or a universal, transcendental reason. To give ground to pluralism on this point,

however, would seem to force a fundamental revision of the basic model, and therefore the content and structure of classicalliberal or Kantian thought. Yet for aIl his criticisms of Locke and the classical tradition and Kant and what might perhaps be termed the rationalliberal tradition, Berlin does not for a moment deny

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that their proponents are legitimate liberals. Indeed, Berlin's liberalism is c1early deeply influenced by at least sorne of Locke and Kant's ideas Locke's commitment to

empiricism, for example, or Kant's idea that freedom of choice is a precondition of moral life. In allowing that these traditions represent powerful and insightful articulations of liberalism, and yet remain fundamentally different and in sorne degree incompatible with his own thought, Berlin c1early relies on a general conception of liberalism much broader than his own particular position. The point can be driven home by raising one further case - the utilitarian liberalism of Jeremy Bentham and James Mill. 32 For utilitarian liberals like Jeremy Bentham or James Mill, happiness represents the natural human end or purpose, but negative liberty is sharply privileged as the efficient means of achieving this condition. Negative liberty is again dominant on political questions, but now not as an expression of rational autonomy as an end-in-itself, as suggested in Kantian thought, nor as a natural human right institutionalized in a social contract, as Locke asserted, but rather as a means conducing to a higher value or objective, human happiness. 33 Like c1assical and rationalist liberalism, utilitarian theory is generally formulated in universal terms for all men at all times and places. Utilitarian liberals seek a permanent and universal objective framework according to which human goals, values and c1aims are commensurable and can be measured against each other on a scale of human happiness, so that no authentically radical or tragic conflict need arise. Here then is a third form of liberalism, quite different from the Lockean c1assical tradition or the Kantian rational tradition. One point that they share in common is the overriding political role of negative liberty. A second point that they share is that they all seem inconducive to the theses ofhistoricism, pluralism, radical choice and tragedy that Berlin is anxious to re-introduce into political thought, and which are Integral to his liberalism. Berlin persistently criticizes Locke, Kant and Bentham for what he sees as their monism, their presumptive universality, their blindness to the agonizing problems of politicallife. 34 He fully recognizes that not all forms ofliberalism will be consonant or even compatible with his own particular view. He is generally careful to specify that writers like Locke, Kant and Bentham and their attendant traditions represent particular forms of liberalism, not the thing itself. In other places, he writes and speaks of many

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liberals holding uncompromisingly to negative liberty (in one formulation or another), but he is generally careful to indicate that this need not be the case for allliberais. The important differences between Locke, Kant and utilitarians - between the concept of freedom as a right and as a dutYand as an efficient means, or as a product of contract and as an exercise of self-realization and as a self-interested ca1culus - also already point to sorne of the profound issues that divide liberals. These differences illuminate the real degree of pluralism among even conventionalliberal views. If we consider more recent liberal views, the apparent pluralism becomes even more strikingly evident. For Rawls, for example, politicalliberalism is first and foremost political justice,35 for Dworkin it is an overriding principle of equality,36 for Rorty, it is an ironie position, devoted primarily to personal poetic self-re-creation,37 for William Galston it is about protecting diversity.3 8 Negative liberty does, in sorne formulation, retain a central role on these liberalisms, but it need not be in itselfthe exclusively overriding political value. Berlin does specif)r that liberal views which do sharply privilege negative liberty, such as conventional views, are the most consistent liberal models. In view of their focus on the dominant value ofliberty, they, in a sense, must be. Monism is generally more consistent than pluralism, which takes at least sorne potential inconsistency as salutary. Still, if Berlin refers to these conventional forms of liberalism as the mast consistent forms of liberalism, the superlative implies that there are other, less consistent, forms of liberalism. Berlin's own liberalism turns out, 1will argue, to be ofthis less consistent variety. What Berlin's particular pluralist liberalism consists in still needs to be spelled out. What should be clear at this point is that Berlin exhibits a general view of liberalism, which encompasses conventionalliberalisms; moreover, in-so-far as he rejects these liberalisms and yet defines himself as a liberal, he also holds to a distinctive variant under the general classification. Now, in-so-far as, Berlin's concepts ofhistoricism, strong pluralism, radical conflict and tragedy do seem to extend to public questions, they do come into direct conflict with conventionalliberalisms. Many of Berlin's critics and interpreters have recognized this point of conflict, and conc1uded that Berlin's position reveals essential incoherence. 1 want to argue that this conclusion relies on the insistence that if Berlin is a

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liberal, he must be a conventionalliberal. Berlin also recognized this tension, and for this reason quite explicitly distanced himself from these liberal traditions:
It is true, as Crowder points out, that pluralists sometimes urge the particular importance, on their views, of sorne value such as autonomy, which on other views may be more or less important, or perhaps of no value at all. Once again, there is no inconsistency between their doing this, and their accepting that this is one value among others. If they move to asserting the overriding importance of this value, as some ZiberaIs do, then they may begin to be in trouble with pluraZism. But then pluraZists will not be that kind ofZiberaI .... 39 [ia]

Berlin asserts that 'pluralists will not be that kind of liberal' who insists on the overriding importance of sorne particular value, such as rational autonomy with attendant negative liberty, or of negative liberty itself. The pluralist liberal will not seek to privilege anyone value or concept over all others. The question remains, then, if the pluralist liberal does not assert the overriding value of liberty in moral and political questions, what sort of liberal will the pluralist be? How can the pluralist liberal keep faith with the roots of liberalism, as reflected, for example, in its conventional forms? Before attempting to answer this difficult question, it will be helpful to consolidate Berlin's idea of the pluralist liberal. Berlin describes his view as follows: All we can do is to protect choices from being too agonizing and that means that what we need is a kind ofsystem which permits pursuit ofseveral values so that, so far as possible, there arises no situation which makes men do something which is contrary ta their deepest moral convictions. In a ZiberaI society ofa pluraZist kind there is no avoiding compromises; they are bound to be made: the very worst can be averted by tradeoffs. So much for this, so much for that. How much equality, how much liberty? How muchjustice, how much mercy? How much kindness, how much truth? I beZieve in a pluraZist democracy, which demands consultation and compromise, which recognizes the daims - rights - ofgroups and individuals and which, except in situations ofextreme crisis, is forbidden ta reject democratic decisions. 40 [ia] Berlin calls for 'a kind of system which permits pursuit of several values,' a pluralistic framework. Characteristically, Berlin is primarily concerned with managing a range of ultimate values which may clash agonizingly. In particular, he is anxious to avoid, "so far as possible," situations in which individuals are forced to do something "contrary to their deepest moral convictions." He thinks that pluralist liberalism is profoundly concerned with avoiding insensitivity to diverse deep convictions and to 'averting,' where possible, the worst conflicts between them. These concerns already imply, of
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course, that there may be at least two values which may rise to equal ultimacy. This possibility is ref1ected in the range of values and ideals that Berlin is concerned to balance at the end of the passage - liberty, equality, justice, mercy, kindness, truth. Liberty is characteristically included among the basic values which must be, where possible, traded-off. It is also ref1ected in Berlin's central assertion that for the pluralist liberal, there is no avoiding compromises. They are bound to occur because ultimate values will collide in particular cases. In sum, pluralist liberalism is defined for Berlin by strong pluralism and democracy with emphasis on consultation and compromise, discussion, debate and decision even on the most basic values and principles. It emphasizes very broad recognition both of individuals and groups, and the diverse claims and basic models that they bring to politicallife. These features of pluralist liberalism, however, beg sorne questions which will help to further clarify Berlin's political model: (first) why does embracing a system allowing the pursuit of several potentially incommensurable values necessarily encourage compromise? Faced with a radical choice, is it not possible in view of incommensurability itselffor a politYsimply to choose to embrace one conf1icting value or the other? (Second,) why should democracy play so key a role in the resolution of disputes, and particularly radical conf1icts? Is democracy (and its underlying value of positive liberty in general) not, in Berlin's thought, simply one value among others? Is response to the first question it must be emphasized that pluralist liberalism does not guarantee or coerce particular compromises. It rather recognizes that sometimes they will offer the best solution to troubling problems and seeks to provide a conducive environment which encourages them. Of course, in sorne cases tradeoffs or compromises will not be a viable option. Sometimes particular problems will not allow for much compromise, but rather by their very nature will demand clear decisions - whether to go to war or not, where to build an important institution or whether to recognize a new
nation. These types of 'yes or no' questions often do not leave much room for

compromise. In other cases, moral and political conf1icts can be too acute to allow room for compromise. If a principle is sacred and is believed to be very deeply and unjustifiably threatened, even to the level of its minimum threshold, its defenders may quite reasonably choose to stand or fall on the principle, without giving ground or

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diluting it. 41 In such extreme cases, Berlin suggests, that a degree of commensurability will often be discoverable which can provide a basis for resolution if it is seriously pursued. In still other cases, however, it may not, or contending parties may simply not be able to establish enough common ground and trust to achieve any workable compromise. On the other hand, in many cases compromise may turn out to be unnecessary because something stronger, a reconciliation or, upon reflection, a strong moral judgment may be possible. Competing values need not always turn out to be either incommensurable or incompatible, or their conflict inescapable. Often, even when they are not compatible, they may be managed so that really fundamental clashes do not arise, provided there is awareness of, and sensitivity to, their potential conflict. Sometimes, even where they do seem to clash, the matter can be worked out. Sometimes, they can be traced to confusions of language, to archaisms or misuses of terms, or inflations or deflations of meaning, which can be corrected. In these cases compromise may be unnecessary. Nonetheless, on Berlin's view at least, sometimes particular cases will arise where values will clash incompatibly, incommensurably and inescapably so that radical choices will have to be made, and still others in which there will be room for accommodations which express sorne respect for both values according to the particular case. The essential question then is why pluralist liberalism promotes compromise and tradeoffs in these cases more effectively than do classical forms of liberalism or other monistic political frameworks. Four fairly straightforward answers seem possible: in the first place, the recognition of a diverse range of equally ultimate values promotes an environment of mutual recognition which provides an essential precondition to the working out of compromises and tradeoffs. In this sense, pluralist liberalism may be argued to support a moral and political sensitivity essential to a dynamic political
discourse capable of revealing potential commensurabilities. If only one value is

recognized as predominant, not only will defenders of that value be less encouraged to consider the possibility of compromise, but also other values will suffer from either little or no recognition at aIl. Indeed, a sharply hierarchical public ordering of values may be plausibly argued to encourage a winner-take-all mentality in relation to political

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discourse. More strikingly, a monistic or conventionalliberal framing of public questions leaves open the possibility ofpushing dissent out of formai public discourse entirely. A hierarchical system of public values may equally be charged with encouraging legal, formaI or constitutional appeals rather than political exchanges leading to compromise. 42

In the second place, a pluralist liberal framework subjects troubling questions in general
to public contestation which tends to render all parties dependent on the flexibility and sensitivity of others on at least sorne questions, and therefore generates a self-interest in demonstrating flexibility and sensitivity and building trust absent under a pre-established hierarchy of values. Thus, even where proponents of a particular value could force a onesided resolution on a particular question, they are encouraged to refrain, since other questions will arise in which they will not be in so strong a position, and must be dependent on the flexibility and sensitivity of others. In the third place, a pluralist liberal public sphere leaves difficult questions open to re-visitation and continuaI protest, so that the costs of forcing a one-sided solution on a particular matter can be precipitously increased by a vocal minority with a strong case. Finally, in sensitizing participants in political life to the possibility of radical and tragic conflict, pluralist liberalism encourages a willingness to manage competing claims so that 'intolerable choices' will not arise, and this will often involve compromises and tradeoffs necessary to avoid such eventualities. In adopting so grave a concern with these issues of radical and tragic conflict, Berlin's thought differs sharply from the main lines of conventionalliberalism.

In each of these four respects then, pluralist liberalism encourages, although it cannot
insure, a willingness to compromise where possible. Turning then to the key raIe of democratic institutions in pluralist liberal political life, two basic points are suggested. In the first place, from a pluralist liberal perspective the value of democratic institutions extend far beyond their obvious roots in the value of positive liberty, and draw support from their coherence with a range of other central
pluralist liberal values: democratic institutions may be said also to provide for an

essential equality in public life, for a tolerance of diverse opinion, for a degree of civility in political contestation, for a degree of community through collective self-government, as well as, Berlin emphasizes, for a means of protecting a meaningful range of negative liberty and a system ofjustice reflective of the popular conscience. 43 In these ways,

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democratic institutions may be said to be particularly strongly grounded in Berlin's pluralist liberalism. Moreover, democratic governance allows citizens to choose and not be chosen for. In essence, democratic choice avoids paternalism, which Berlin frequently joins Kant in condemning as 'the greatest conceivable despotism. ,44 From the pluralist liberal perspective, wherein a wide range of basic models of moral and politicallife appear equally plausible, and equally deserving of respect and recognition, this feature of democratic life is crucial, particularly in relation to radical choices where reason cannot dictate an appropriate resolution. In essence, democratic institutions allow people to choose for themselves in relation to public life, just as negative liberty allows them to choose in relation to their own individuallives. Nonetheless, democratic institutions, however important, are still not viewed as unqualified goods from a pluralist liberal perspective. This reservation is reflected in Berlin's reference to crises which may occur. Majorities may attempt to trample the baseline thresholds ofultimate values, including those ofnegative liberty or justice, or to subvert positive liberty and democracy itself - by, for example, seeking to effectively disenfranchise sorne group. In these crisis cases, it may be legitimate to resist democratic choices, although there are reasonable limits to resistance as well - Berlin insists that human lives should in general not be sacrificed to moral and political principles. 45 Still, this limitation leaves a great deal ofroom for protest, non-cooperation, non-violent resistance, and civil disobedience. Evidently, this sort of crisis of democracy is likely to involve unfortunate consequences, particularly on the social and institutional fabric of a society. The fact that on a pluralist liberal view this sort of crisis always represents a real possibility provides one more reason for the pursuit of compromise wherever possible. This description of Berlin's pluralist liberalism, however, begs the following question: it is clear how this position is strongly pluralist, but how is it liberal? Berlin's pluralist liberal, in sharp contrast with classical, rational and utilitarian liberals, allows for a range of recognizable basic values, ends, and commitments, similarly ultimate, similarly sacred. Nonetheless, liberty is at least one ultimate value which is common to all the liberal cases that Berlin discusses. Much of Berlin's particular argument is directed to the idea that negative liberty clearly qualifies for us as an ultimate value, as at least one among the range of basic values. 1think that this insistence represents one part

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ofwhat Berlin thinks is essentially liberal in his pluralist liberalism - negative liberty is at least among the deepest strata, the most basic, values, ends or commitments. This formulation of the basic sense ofliberalism, as respecting negative liberty as an ultimate value, opens up the possibility of other equally ultimate values or ends, and hence the possibility of strong pluralism. This in turn points to a second sense in which Berlin's strong pluralism comports well with liberalism - it recognizes a range ofdiverse values which have, in one way or another, also been central to the liberal tradition, including positive liberty and democracy, happiness, justice, equality, tolerance and civility. This understanding of pluralist liberalism helps to show why Berlin frequently associates liberalism with a range of commitments or ideas, as in the following cases: Berlin writes that many nineteenth century liberals embraced "belief in freedom from government dictation; in civilliberties, in equality, in human rights, in a form of democracy....,,46 He argues that liberal slogans thematize a range of values, including "freedom, moral regeneration, altruism, human solidarity....,,47 He suggests that in this sense, socialists too may be pluralistic in a way similar to sorne (here 'left-wing') liberals: Nor were sorne of the ideals of the average socialist - liberty, political and judicial equality of opportunity, internationalism, anti-imperialism and peace - so different from those of the average left-wing libera1. 48 Berlin lays particular stress on the case of welfare or New Dealliberals, who seem to him to want to balance a range of essential values, including equality, justice and prosperity, despite the obvious constraints on negative liberty.49 For Berlin's pluralist liberal, then, liberty is not necessarily the sole or dominant value. 5o In "Two Concepts Liberty," Berlin writes 1 do not wish to say that individual freedom is, even in the most liberal societies, the sole, or even the dominant criterion of social action. We compel children to be educated, and we forbid public executions. These are certainly curbs to freedom. We justify them on the ground that ignorance, or barbarian upbringing, or cruel pleasures and excitements are worse for us than the amount of restraint
needed ta repress them. This judgment in turn depends on how we determine

good and evil, that is to say, on our moral religious, intellectual, economic and aesthetic values; which are, in their turn, bound up with our conception of man, and of the basic demands ofhis nature. In other words, our solution of such basic problems is based on our vision, by which we are consciously or unconsciously guided, of what constitutes a fulfilled human life, as contrasted with Mill's 'cramped and dwarfed,' 'pinched and hidebound' natures. To protest against laws

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governing censorship or personal morals as intolerable infringements of personal liberty presupposes a belief that the activities which such laws forbid are fundamental needs of men as men, in a good (in, indeed, any) society. To defend such laws is to hold that these needs are not essential, or that they cannot be satisfied without sacrificing other values which come higher - satisfy deeper needs - than individual freedom ....51 As Berlin stresses elsewhere, he does not mean to take a position here on the general questions oflaws governing censorship or personal morals,52 but rather to say something about the kinds of arguments that may be offered and the way they link up with equally plausible visions of 'what constitutes a fulfilled human life.' Berlin wants to stress that both types of arguments may legitimately be put forward by liberals. The former argument is characteristic of those types of liberalism which place a unique premium on liberty; the latter type of argument is at least available to the pluralist liberal, although he might equally maintain, in a given case, that negative liberty, may override other values. Both views may be designated as liberal as both at least show respect for liberty. The basic liberal claim, on this construction, is that there is always an onus of justification upon those who would override, deny or re-interpret the value of negative liberty. 53 Conventionalliberals of course not only meet but surpass this criterion. They not only respect negative liberty as a basic value, but privilege it over aIl competing or rival values, at least on political questions. It is this move that 'gets them in trouble with pluralism.' It still, however, qualifies them for liberalism. The Kantian, the pluralist, the utilitarian, romantic and New Dealliberal will aIl meet this simple criterion. It captures the sense in which, while different, they are aIl essentially liberals. This basic sense of liberalism also lines up neatly with common usage, and wellestablished definitions of the word. As Maurice Cranston has it in the Encyclopaedia of

Philosophy, "by definition the liberal is a man who believes in liberty.,,54 The Cambridge International Dictionary ofEnglish defines liberalism as "respecting and
allowing many different types ofbelief and behavior." In relation to politics it specifies "believing in or allowing more personal freedom and a development towards a fairer sharing of wealth and power in society.,,55 Liberalism as involving a belief in liberty but allowing for other beliefs, such as equality or fairness, seems very close to Berlin's understanding. The liberal belief in liberty does not preclude other, similarly deep

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beliefs. This basic sense can mediate between the very broad sense in which liberalism means for Rorty being a child of the Enlightenment, as well as the way in which it can be a general moral or political theory, and the ways in which it is currently employed in politicallife. It defines a source in which allliberais take root, and with which aH remain essentially consistent. It represents what Berlin elsewhere calls "the common kernel of meaning which is essential to avoid distortion."S6 This understanding of liberalism also lines up weIl with Berlin's historicism, as weIl as with his deep concern with the moral risk of radical choice and tragedy. In relation to his historicism, this understanding illuminates the sense in which liberalism can be continuous across quite different epochs and cultures, and may simultaneously take very diverse forms bound up in complex ways with local values, concepts and models. It also clarifies the radical and tragic possibilities Berlin perceives within liberalism itself. Ultimate values or ends can collide, both between liberalisms, within forms of liberal pluralism and with other non-liberal values, ends, ideas. Sorne forms, like classicalliberalism, may strive to minimize exposure to the possibility of internaI conflict by focusing preponderantly on the priority of negative liberty in public matters. Of course, this may not prevent negative liberty from itself clashing internally, or externally with other values held no less fervently (and reasonably) by other citizens. A society predicated on negative liberty may, as Berlin argues, preclude other ultimate values of no less significance which can only be achieved through the moderation of negative liberty. The more that classicalliberalism pursues internaI consistency, the more it is open to external challenge on the basis of claims that are no less ultimate, no less reasonable, such as justice, equality, or community.S7 Conventionalliberalism may indeed then be the most consistent form of liberalism, but even this cannot fully insulate it from the possibility of radical and tragic conflict, at least on Berlin's view. Other forms of liberalism, however, such as pluralist or New Dealliberalism embrace the idea of
moral risk more deliberately and self-consciously than conventionalliberalism.

We can now begin crudely to consolidate Berlin's view ofliberalism in general, and in particular his own pluralist liberalism. The basic sense of liberalism is simply respect for negative liberty (as at least among the Great Goods or ultimate values). Beyond this basic sense Berlin sees liberalism as a highly diverse, pluralistic tradition.

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His pluralist liberalism strives to respect both of these features of liberalism. His general idea of strong pluralism is that there are a range of sometimes rivalrous ultimate goods which modern Westerners widely and reasonably hold, including pluralism itself. His own particular pluralist liberalism essentiaUy marks a sub-set of these objective values which Berlin is committed to defending, including at least the foUowing values: liberty (both negative and positive - especiaUy in the sense of democracy), equality (of general opportunity and condition), community, justice, toleration, pluralism, civility, and no doubt a number of others - and his liberalism is definitely open-ended, and directed to persuasion. It, moreover, admits of other objective values which other citizens may defend with equal reason, and which may clash with liberal values radicaUy or even tragicaUy. Berlin' s pluralist liberalism meets the criterion of respecting negative liberty as an ultimate value, and respects the internaI pluralism of the liberal tradition. On the other hand, it meets the criterion of strong pluralism in recognizing a range of sometimes incommensurable, sometimes incompatible, ultimate values. Berlin takes pluralism itself then to be an integral element not only in his concept of political thought, but in his liberalism as weIl. What becomes essential on his view is how can we go about arguing the particular cases out? How can we negotiate and compromise? And, above aU, how can we most effectively avoid 'intolerable choices'? This understanding of Berlin's general and pluralist liberalism also helps to explain why Berlin's thought appears as a serious anomaly in liberal-communitarian and liberal-pluralist debates. Berlin's pluralist liberalism seems to cross-over into aU three camps - liberal, communitarian and pluralist. He ranks negative liberty, community membership and pluralism aU in the category of currently recognizable ultimate values, and even incorporates community and pluralism as liberal values. In-so-far as communitarians are those that embrace community as an ultimate value, Berlin qualifies
as a communitarian. Similarly, ifwe consider Sandel's deftnition suggesting that

communitarians are concerned with "politics of the common good" as opposed to the "politics of rights," Berlin will again easily qualify, for he is a theorist distant from rights theory, and is concerned with the intercourse of commonly recognized Great Goods or ultimate values. 58 The centerpiece ofhis thought is the public world of commonly

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recognizable values. The attempt to draw a sharp division between liberals and communitarians or liberals and pluralists is therefore somewhat misleading. There can be important overlaps of these positions. Many self-avowed communitarians and pluralists similarly want to respect basic liberty whatever other values or ends or concepts they may wish to urge, and whatever models they may draw on to justify these claims. LiberaIs may also be communitarians, and communitarians liberals. This is a point which has long been urged by liberal participants in the debate.
59

In Berlin's view, a great many of the

disputes which arise on these debates seem best understood as internaI to liberalism, where they serve to reveal its internaI pluralism. On the other hand, there also remains a rump of authentically non-liberal communitarian and pluralist views. The reconfiguration of the contemporary debates that Berlin's work catalyzes suggests a focus on two questions: first, should we be liberals or non-liberals in the sense of respecting negative liberty? Second, should we be pluralists or monists in terms of recognizing other equally ultimate values? Berlin presents a pluralist world in which these may aIl be reasonable human possibilities, but within that world he chooses and defends pluralist liberalism. Berlin's pluralist liberalism then is forced to fight a threefront war against the other possible answers, against monist liberals on one side, pluralist non-liberals on a second and non-liberal monists on a third. Berlin focuses the bulk of his own criticism on the third, non-liberal monist position. His criticisms of monist liberalism and pluralist non-liberalism are more scattered. The intersection ofthese two categories - liberal and non-liberal, pluralist and monist - can be expressed on a table. This table is obviously highly simplified, but it can be given sorne depth by adding that in each case the views may be opened or closed to the possibility of fundamental revision, and dismissive or persuasive in relation to competing views.
LiberaIs Piuralist pluralist liberals like Berlin, Bernard Williams,
William Galston

Non-LiberaIs non-liberal pluralists like Gray, Kekes, Vico, Herder, Herzen, Hamann and l would say
Nietzsche and Machiavelli although they can

Monist

Enlightenment liberals, Locke, as weIl as Kant, Bentham, and contemporary writers like Rawls, Rorty and Dworkin

also be read as monists many Classical, theological, metaphysical, teleological thinkers, including Aristotle, Hobbes, Marxists, de Maistre, fascists, sorne nationalists, and many unbridled romantics

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Each of these crudely designated possibilities represent real and recognizable human views which have been passionately defended by important Western thinkers. Each also has its contemporary adherents. Berlin's own position clearly faUs within the upper-Ieft pluralist-liberal category, and we might add that it is an open-ended and persuasive version ofthis perspective. From a pluralist perspective, like Berlin's, none of the positions can be dismissed out ofhand. This recognition of, and engagement with, other perspectives is, l think, a strength of the pluralist liberal position. Berlin's most intense and vituperative critiques are reserved for monist nonliberals. Both Marx and de Maistre, who are among the thinkers whom Berlin most substantiaUy interprets, are, on his reading, best classified in this category, but this orientation in no sense reduces the interest or insight of their work. Berlin uncovers enough conceptual incoherencies, implausible assumptions, casuistries, and empirical inaccuracies, that he believes that the overaU positions are rendered unpersuasive, or at least in need of serious adjustment. He also perceives, however, that both of these theorists ultimately appeal to distinctive concepts of human nature. These concepts, he recognizes, are not susceptible of definitive proof or disproof. They may, however, when linked up with substantial theory, be more or less convincing. His conclusion then seems to be to praise Marx and de Maistre for sensitizing us to these underlying models as real human possibilities and thus alerting us to the particularity of our own underlying models, but he also finaUy rejects their particular constructions as unpersuasive - Marx for an eccentric and ultimately indefensible conception ofhistorical inevitability, de Maistre for his anti-empirical dogmatism, inconsistencies and wild exaggeration. 60 Berlin is particularly skeptical in-so-far as bothjettison respect for negative liberty as an ultimate value in favor ofwhat he broadly characterizes as 'from-the-other-shore' arguments, whereby the suppression of current liberties wiU be justified at sorne nebulous future emancipation (at which time the warrant will become clear). His responsive
defense of a range of ultimate values including negative liberty leads forcefully back to

his pluralist liberalism. If Berlin defends his pluralist liberal position against non-liberal monists, he defends it no less against liberal monists, such as conventionalliberals. Berlin draws attention to the sharp differences between monist liberals who insist that one perspective

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must be exc1usively correct, generally universally, and pluralists who are willing to al10w that in sorne cases there may be more than one true answer, and especial1y pluralist historicists who allow that these truths may change over time. Berlin argues that monism, even in pursuit of initially noble goals, is a historically, prudentially, normatively, conceptually and epistemologically weak, unpersuasive and politically dangerous position. Berlin thinks that while his historicist, pluralist liberalism is more modest than conventionalliberalism in its contextual, interpretive framework, and in the kind of privilege it c1aims for negative liberty, it is also more assertive in the sense of arguing for and from a wider range of objectively recognizable basic values. Despite its more modest structure it may nonetheless be a strong form of liberalism. It is strong, in particular, in exhibiting the confidence to confront its opponents on even ground, and to learn from them rather than attempting to exc1ude or disqualifY them in advance. It calls for liberty and other ultimate values recognizable in the modern West to be upheld against unreasonable imposition. Berlin's pluralist liberalism is a complex, multifaceted position, firmly interpretively defended, but always open to the possibility of fundamental revision. 61 On the remaining flank pluralist liberalism confronts non-liberal pluralists. 62 Certain forms of communitarianism and pluralism, for example, may still be incompatible with liberalism, but on Berlin's basic understanding this will occur only in cases where negative liberty is sharply subordinated to community membership or pluralism itself. Such forms of communitarianism or pluralism which actively subordinate negative liberty are not necessarily unreasonable, or incomprehensible, but real human possibilities. For us, however, given our history, institutions and political life, they face great difficulties of demonstration or persuasion. Negative liberty does not seem, in Berlin's view, to require any special privilege in competing with such views indeed, reliance on such privileges, if anything, undermines its credibility. Ta extend a procedural privilege to negative liberty gives proponents of other basic values a legitimate ground of complaint, and imposes an unwieldy epistemological burden on liberalism. It, further, begs the question of why negative liberty needs a procedural privilege particularly if it is as basic and essential to us as liberals suggest. In essence, it

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makes negative liberty out to be weak when in fact it is strong. Berlin's own work contains an array of historical, consequentialist, normative and conceptual arguments adequate to sustain a strong interpretive justification of negative liberty as an ultimate value for us. Indeed, once liberalism is defined in terms of respect for negative liberty, then it is apparent that there is a wide (although not universal) agreement on this value - indeed, a tangible mainstream alignment. As Gray argues to effect, conservatives have largely become classicalliberals, and it may be argued that socialists too seem to have accepted negative liberty as at least a basic value. 63 Berlin, however, is more apt to lament the disappearance of socialism as a real political force in the contemporary West. 64 There is then something like a consensus among most major mainstream thinkers that negative liberty constitutes an ultimate value for us. This re-enforces Berlin's sense that negative liberty requires no special procedural privilege to remain a basic orienting value for us. Berlin's point is, 1think, that there are significant obstacles to non-liberal pluralist views becoming widely persuasive for us. In order to do so, anti-liberal views face an important onus of demonstration. In sum, Berlin's pluralist liberalism then is historicist in that it is framed modestly in terms of plausible interpretation, and is focused in its main conclusions upon where we are right now, and does not necessarily extend generally to ail people at ail times; it is strongly pluralist in that it allows for a wide-range of equally ultimate values; it is open to the possibility of radical and tragic choice in that it allows that the range of values or ends embraced are capable of rationally irresolvable conflict. On the other hand, it remains liberal in the sense that it retains its commitment to negative liberty as a recognizable ultimate value for us, and embraces a range of values which have been central to the liberal tradition. However, there is nothing in the general pluralist condition that precludes non-liberal models or frameworks which do not see negative
liberty as an ultimate value.

There is, then, no direct argument from strong pluralism to liberalism. It may be argued that liberalism, or at any rate certain forms of liberalism, comport better than the alternatives with a condition and value of strong pluralism, but such a claim has to be continually worked out in terms of the actual alternatives. This helps to explain why

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Berlin, in contrast to more conventionalliberals, is so persistently concerned with understanding and engaging with non-liberal thinkers - as Michael Ignatieffhas it: What made him unusual was that he deliberately moved out beyond the well-lit playing area of academic liberalism, where John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin were re-fashioning the heritage of Kant and Mill to fit the modern age, into the dark undergrowth of modern irrationalism. Berlin was the only liberal thinker of real consequence to take the trouble to enter the mental worlds of liberalism' s sworn enemies. 65 There is nothing then which is necessarily incompatible about Berlin's views of pluralism and liberalism either at the generallevel or as they are manifested in his pluralist liberalism. Moreover, Berlin' s particular view of pluralist liberalism fits appropriately into the general categories. The particular position he embraces and defends draws selectively on what he sees as the best of the Enlightenment and Romantic traditions. If negative liberty, for example, or justice are characteristically ultimate Enlightenment values, so community and pluralism are characteristically ultimate romantic goods. Berlin's thought bridges the richest insights ofthese traditions as it bridges the contemporary debates in political theory, exposing new configurations and tensims. In recognizing
a~d

defending a range of equally ultimate values, Berlin embraces

and exhorts, as 1 have argued, an essentially tragic disposition which accepts a degree of moral risk as both necessary and desirable. He argues indeed that all moral and political models entail a degree of moral risk, and once we are convinced of this we can better appreciate the merits of pluralist liberalism. On this view, moral risk is explicitly recognized and may be managed, and the degree of risk justified. It is finally the importance of the ultimate values or Great Goods or ends-in-themselves, the degree to which they enrich our lives and their integral importance to our concepts of human nature and our identities, which warrant a degree of risk tolerance. Where and how far this tolerance should extend, however, is c1early a matter ofinterpretation. Berlin's pluralist liberalism is presented as one reasonable interpretation, he argues the most persuasive, of what moral and political risk should be taken. Returning then to the critics with which this section began, Berlin could maintain that Gray and Kekes are mistaken to think pluralism and liberalism are necessarily

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incompatible. His own case shows something different. His liberalism is not universalist, as Gray suggests, but a species of what Gray elsewhere admits is a potentially defensible position - a historicist liberalism, fully impregnated with strong pluralism (although of a more restrained variety than Gray attributes to him).66 ln response to Kekes and Mack, Berlin could answer that although his liberal values are "defeasible," guiding values, and not overriding, and may thus be legitimately superseded in some particular cases, his position is no less liberal for that. Ifto be guided by, and to defend, liberal values is not to be liberal, what is it then? Berlin's case offers support to Matthew Lawrence's forceful protest that even Kekes' own very limited (four) examples of liberals committed to overriding values (of which Berlin is one) are contestable, and, on examination, are not in fact so committed, and therefore do not preclude pluralism. 67 Finally, Cohen's objection that Berlin's liberalism sees only negative liberty as "literally liberty" and lays too little stress on positive liberty and by consequence is insensitive to "the economic attitudes of recent liberals," particularly welfare liberals, seems equally misplaced. Berlin's pluralist liberalism not only tightly embraces democratic institutions, but sees equality as an ultimate value with which compromises should be struck - Berlin declares, "You asked me what 1believe in. 1believe in the Welfare state. That is exactly what 1 do believe in, 1 believe in the New Deal. That is roughly what my beliefs are.,,68 One important objection that may be raised at this point is that pluralist liberalism, as thus presented, seems perilously optimistic. Opening up a realm of internaI pluralism, throwing open the doors of serious public discussion and judgment, and particularly, vesting a great deal of authority in democratic decision, at the very least constitutes a grave risk for conventionalliberals, who might respond, and not without reason, that even if there is a strong case for pluralist liberalism against its rivaIs, especially in particular cases, Berlin relies on general powers of discrimination and judgment for which he provides little evidence. People believe aIl sorts of things. What stability and security can there be for liberalism if at any time public judgment could turn against it? Indeed, how can anyone be sure what liberalism would secure if its own values are rivalrous and their relationship undetermined in advance? Berlin might respond that such an objection underestimates the deep embededness of liberal values and goods in themselves, their continuing importance to reallives and

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their effective defensibility in particular cases. The contemporary convergence on liberalism in its basic sense, while not strictly universal, nonetheless illustrates the dynamism of the essentialliberal view in the contemporary West. This line of critique exaggerates the threat because it has lost confidence in the power of its own insight and vision. It yearns for the reassuring certainties of metaphysics, theology and teleology. If discrimination and judgment are lacking in public discussion, then that is a reason to focus on better preparing citizens for participating in public life, for making moral and political choices, and not a reason to fear popular will and to try to restrict it within a narrow and inoffensive band. Pluralist liberalism revives a traditionalliberal emphasis on public education, on providing people with the instruments to think philosophically, to work out solutions to problems which suggest no obvious techniques, which are troubling or contested. 69 To take the alternative approach of imposing a permanent framework or ordering of public values, on public discourse, judgment or action is a paternalism, which, in Berlin's view, disrespects individual and collective freedom, conscience, pluralism, tolerance and our best self-understanding.

6.iii Two Concepts of Liberalism: Berlin and Rawls

In this section I want to briefly compare Berlin's political thought and liberalism with that of the most influential thinker in contemporary American political theory, John Rawls, and particularly with Rawls' Political Liberalism. In the opening chapter we saw how Berlin's principal interpreters generally saw Berlin's and Rawls' approaches to political thought and liberalism as deeply incompatible and rivalrous, while Rawls and his interpreters tended to see them as basically compatible - in essence, c1aiming that Berlin would be willing to join in Rawls' reasonable overlapping consensus. Neither side, however, subjected the question to any sustained comparative scrutiny. Here I will argue that Berlin's interpreters are correct, and that comparative examination ultimately reveals the foots of two sharply different and rivalrous strategies for reviving political
thought in the face of apparent moral and political pluralism, and correspondingly two

quite distinct liberalisms. Rawls' theory is very complex and detailed, so that nothing more than an initial impression can be hoped for in this brief overview, but even the initial impression, I think, is striking. There are not merely important disagreements between the two

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thinkers, but there is a fundamental contrast of orientations that runs down through their accounts of liberalism, their approaches to political theory, to their basic models of, and dispositions to, modern Western man. The most vivid expression of this fundamental divergence is that Berlin's political thought will appear, on Rawls' construction of politicalliberalism, as in important respects both unreasonable and illiberal, and hence unworthy of serious consideration in public discourse on basic political questions. Rawls' theory, by contrast, will seem from the perspective ofBerlin's pluralist liberalism, not merely as implausible, futile, and monistic in sorne important respects, but as uncivilized in-so-far as it refuses to engage with fundamentally opposed positions, and hence to recognize its own core interpretive contingency - although this will not similarly exclude it from serious attention. The theoretical divergence which rapidly becomes apparent between the two thinkers reveals something of the fundamental divergence in dispositions which underlie the two larger revivaIs in political thought to which they contributed, and, very generally, concerning the traditions that arose out ofthese revivals - although, as we will see in the final chapter, there has been a great deal of crossfertilization in recent years. An orienting guideline can perhaps be found in Rawls' statement in the final section of A Theory ofJustice, which seems to hold true through Political Liberalism, that "the notion of radical choice ... finds no place in justice as fairness."?O By contrast, radical choice is integral to both the descriptive concept and the normative value of pluralism which animate Berlin's political thought and liberalism. In essence, Rawls seeks to neutralize the very condition that animates Berlin's political thought. In the remainder of the section, 1 will first touch on sorne significant points of general similarity between the two theoretical positions, then describe the general form of Rawls' theory, consider sorne points of general dispute, and then follow the concerns raised by these points back to the underlying sources of disagreement.
First then, while 1 will argue that a fundamental disparity divides Berlin and

Rawls, there are also sorne general points of similarity which deserve mention. To begin with, Rawls exhibits, especially in his later work, a degree ofhistoricism, in that he "starts from within a political tradition,,,?l employs "the kinds of ideas that we associate with liberalism historically,,,n and indeed draws quite specifically on historical

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conditions which he thinks only become possible in a given context - for example, he identifies liberal constitutionalism as a historical discovery which only became possible in the context of the European reformation.
73

On the other hand, especiaUy in his later

work, he addresses at least his general theory with increasing specificity to a particular social and political context - that is, to the contemporary United States. 74 Moreover, Rawls' theory, like Berlin's, exhibits a partial and non-perfectionist quality, in contrast to many forms of Enlightenment and contemporary liberalism. He limits himself to setting a legitimate and stable foundation of public justification, leaving citizens to their own comprehensive doctrines, and the virtues and vices oftheir private lives. 75 Thirdly, Rawls' thought, like Berlin's, recognizes pluralism as a central political issue, although Rawls focuses on a "reasonable" as opposed to a simple or basic pluralism, and the attitude he takes to it, as we wiU see, is quite distinct from Berlin's. FinaUy, Rawls' thought exhibits important similarities in substantial content with Berlin's. He is clearly motivated by sorne of the same values and concems, such as freedom in its positive and negative senses, general equality of opportunity and condition, even, in a lesser way, with the sense ofmembership in a community and certainly with a degree oftoleration. The sharp differences with Berlin emanate more from the structure and aspiration of his political vision than from its general contents. With these points of similarity duly recognized, we can now tum to a brief sketch of Rawls' Political Liberalism. The central problem of Political Liberalism is to work out the content of a political conception ofjustice that on one hand can gain the support of a stable overlapping consensus of reasonable comprehensive doctrines (or general views) of the free and equal citizens of a (liberal) constitutional regime, and on the other hand which can provide a reasonable basis of public justification capable of resolving aU, or almost aU, fundamental political questions. 76 In this pursuit, Rawls undertakes a two-step procedure. The first step, which can be characterized as political constructivism,
involves balancing at least sorne of the settled convictions or fixed points of common

political conviction among citizens as free and equal (that is, consistent with the principle ofreciprocity) with, on the other hand, reasonable and related (freestanding) principles of justice capable of effectively regulating the basic structure of society, until a plausible, mutuaUy-supportive balance (or reflective equilibrium) is discovered. Once such an

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equilibrium is identified, one has a political conception ofjustice which qualifies as a candidate to provide the public structure of political justification for a (liberal) democratic constitutional society. The balancing act of political constructivism occurs through a political modeling procedure in which deliberative appeal is limited to relevant settled convictions to determine which principles ofjustice they will favor. This modeling procedure can be represented by the device of the original position. 77 The second step tests the candidate conception's stability. The structure and character of the political conception are speUed out in greater detail, including its regulative function of framing public reason, and its capacity to form the object of a stable and reasonable overlapping consensus within the type of pluralistic society that it itself promotes is explored. If the candidate is successful, then it has shown that it can constitute the basis of public justification in a (liberal) democratic constitutional society. Once established the political conception defines the public structure of justification and regulates public reason so that only claims which are ultimately capable of appeal to its principles carry weight in formaI public discussion on fundamental political issues, particularly concerning "constitutional essentials" and "matters of basic justice.,,78 Claims can then be assessed in terms of the degree to which they flow from these principles. Indeed, Rawls recommends that citizens formulate their political arguments (and make their voting choices) on the model of supreme court decisions, in order that the linkage to public principles be maximally transparent. 79 Correspondingly, Rawls identifies the Supreme Court as the exemplar of public reason, and its most important (although not sole) exponent and guarantor. Rawls grants that approaching political deliberation and dialogue in this way effectively insulates the core principles of justice from political contestation. The continuaI defense of the foundations of public reason 'cannot be the stuff of daily politics,'80 and it is seen, at least in principle,8\ and at its core, as 'fixed once and for aU,' beyond the scope of democratic repea1. 82 Moreover,
the principles of justice decisively trump competing philosophical and moral frameworks

in public reason. Rawls proposes to treat general moral and philosophical views in public reason with the same principle of toleration which he extends to religious views - that is, to treat them as broadly inappropriate to public reason, at least to the degree that they

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cannot justify themselves in terms of a legitimate member of the family of liberal conceptions ofjustice: it is normally desirable that the comprehensive philosophical and moral views we are wont to use in debating fundamental moral and political issues should give way in public life. Public reason - citizens' reasoning in the public forum about constitutional essentials and basic questions ofjustice - is now best guided by a political conception the principles and values of which aIl citizens can endorse (VI). That political conception is to be, so to speak, political not metaphysical. 83 The disassociation of the political conception ofjustice from general philosophical views, or particularly "long-standing controversies in philosophy,,84 and indeed from comprehensive doctrines in general, is the sense in which it c1aims to be "freestanding.,,85 In fairness to Rawls, however, it must be stressed that this general prec1usion - what has been termed 'gag rules' - relates to the invocation of general moral and philosophical views in formaI discussion of fundamental political issues in the 'public sphere.' Rawls offers a strong defense of free political speech outside of formaI political deliberations. 86 On the other hand, it is easier to defend a wide range of 'subversive' political speech when it is already c1ear that it carries "no weight" in serious public deliberations except to the degree to which it can appeal to consensual 'public reasons': in public reason, the priority of right means (in its general meaning) that the ideas of the good used must be political ideas, so that we need not rely on conceptions of the good but only on ideas tailored to fit within the political conception... the c1aims that citizens make to pursue ends transgressing those limits have no weight. The priority of right gives the principles ofjustice a strict precedence in citizens' deliberations. 87 Rawls' formulation of public reason, l think, presents obvious difficulties for an open-ended, strongly democratic and pluralistic liberalism like Berlin's, and thus presents a promising starting point for exploring the conflicts between their views. It is, l think, worthwhile, however, in attempting to grasp the full scope of their divergence of views, to pause a further moment to sketch the actual political conception ofjustice that Rawls defends, and to allow the particular points of dispute to lead us back to more general difficulties. Rawls' political conception ofjustice is 'justice as fairness,' and it links the following settled convictions with two lexically ordered principles ofjustice: a. The idea of citizens as free and equal, and consequently as acting, at least in political affairs, on the basis of reciprocity - that is, only proposing what they believe other citizens could reasonably embrace.

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b. A conception of the person as encompassing two moral powers, "namely a capacity for a sense ofjustice and a capacity for a conception of the good." c. A conception of a well-ordered society as regulated by certain basic principles held in common. 88 The principles ofjustice which he sees achieving a stable equilibrium with these settled convictions, are (one) the principle of equalliberty, including the basic rights and liberties, and the 'fair value' ofpolitical rights, and (two) the difference principle requiring that social and economic inequalities are to be arranged to the greatest benefit of the least well-off.89 It is important to note at this point that Rawls does not insist that this is the only possible political conception ofjustice, although he thinks it emerges from the procedure of construction as the most authoritative. Nonetheless, he does leave room for "a family of liberal conceptions," although these alternatives seem limited to variations on the second, lexically subordinate principle ofjust distribution. 90 The primacy of the first principle is thus not impinged, and the reasons for this seem clear, for it flows very directly from what Rawls views as the most basic settled conviction, the idea of citizens as free and equal (thus 'the principle of equal freedom'), and the reciprocity principle which for him represents the ultimate criterion of liberallegitimacy. Without delving into the detailed implications of these principles, it seems clear that their content and concerns will not be entirely incongenial from the perspective of Berlin's pluralist liberalism. They embody a possible, although not necessarily a very compelling, vision of a liberal society. What seems immediately problematic is rather (l) the exclusively authoritative status ascribed to these principles, and particularly the former, in public reason, which conflicts with Berlin's defense of open contestation and deliberation, and which appears as both unnecessary and prejudicial to healthy debate and mutual recognition of diverse objective values and basic models in public life - when asked in an interview about Rawls' political theory, Berlin responds " ... the question is who formulates the rules ofjustice? Who formulates them? .... It can't be done ... "91;
(2) their steep lexical relationship which, as we have already seen, Berlin regards as

implausible in view of the apparent range of equally ultimate values, and their complex and unpredictable relation to concrete cases;92 (3) their restricted range (even allowing alternative distributional principles) which fails to do justice to the variety ofwhat he argues are perceptible ultimate values; (4) their hybrid form which merges values which
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are widely understood, admired and embraced independently (as against Berlin's dictum "Liberty is liberty, not equality or fairness or justice or culture ... ");93 (5) the insulation of the political concept ofjustice, or at least its core first principle from democratic repeal, which seems to subordinate what is for Berlin an ultimate value of positive liberty (democratic self-governance);94 and (6) most importantly, the whole point of the exercise, which seems to be to constrain pluralism (which Berlin views as itself an ultimate value) and indeed philosophical dispute (which Berlin sees as inherent in politics) from the realm of public reason. 95 In summary, it appears that Rawls' concept ofjustice, at least in-so-far as it is structured into public reason, (7) exhibits the main feature that Berlin associates with modern monism - "a shift of emphasis away from disagreements about political principles" towards "technical" disagreements concerning "social stability" wherein "arguments concerned with fundamental principles and the ends of life are felt to be 'abstract', 'academic', and unrelated to the urgent needs of the hOUr.,,96 It attempts to create a condition in which aU, or almost aU, answers to troubling political questions are accessible through the public principles ofjustice,97 and thus expresses a craving for certainty which Berlin characterizes as a symptom of "moral and political immaturity.,,98 Ifwe now move to defend Rawls' position against such concerns, deeper divergences begin to emerge. In response to these objections, the Rawlsian can appeal to the whole structure ofjustification which has been set up to support the political conception ofjustice. In particular, he can appeal to (i.) the consonance ofjustice as fairness with the points of settled political conviction; (ii.) justice as fairness' success at the second of stage ofjustification in cohering with reasonable comprehensive doctrines, and forming the basis of a stable overlapping consensus; (iii.) the need for stability; and (iv.) the need for sorne public system ofjustification or basis of normative consensus. 99 The first appeal to the settled political convictions, however, far from resolving
the matters of dispute, hegins to reveal their deeper roots. The second conviction

immediately stands out. Rawls elaborates this distinction as that between persons as reasonable ("the capacity to understand, to apply, and to act from the public conception ofjustice which characterizes the fair terms of social cooperation") and rational ("the capacity to form, to revise, and to rationaUy pursue a conception of one's rational

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advantage or good"): "In justice as faimess, the reasonable and the rational are taken as two distinct and independent basic ideas,,,IOO or as Rawls puts it above, two separate "moral powers." Reason is linked to a sense of public justice and thus to fair principles of social cooperation, while rationality is linked with the instrumental pursuit of private goods. For Berlin, however, this distinction must seem problematic. For him there is no such sharp distinction between being reasonable and rational, between acting from public justice or a private conception of the good - they are both connected with being able to give plausible, understandable explanations for what one does or says or believes, in terms of one's own set of values and basic models. In an interview Berlin explains,
When 1 say right or wrong, 1 mean in the light ofvalues that 1, in my personal life, regard as ends in themselves, everything else being means towards them, for the sake of which 1 am prepared to act, and which in sorne way form, with other values, the constellation ofvalues which shapes my life. Ali that 1 understand. 101 [ia]

In essence, for Berlin right or justice is itself a part of one's good. One's good, however, is not simply rational self-interest, but a constellation of values bound up, at least in sorne part, with the diversity of goods which circulate in one's culture, one's form oflife. Rationality and reasonability, justice and the good, are all intertwined components within a constellation of values which shape one's moral and politicallife. To be reasonable is to be able to show that one's actions and positions derive from one's plausible basic model and values. To be rational is to reason in ways consistent with these models and values. The two are bound together within a moral whole. They cannot be neatly divided so that one relates to private advantage and the other to public justice. Such a division involves the type of 'two-selves' theory Berlin argues is both implausible and dangerous - it sets up the potential of subordinating one purported self to the other. 102 One consequence of Berlin's holistic view ofreason and rationality is that a far
greater diversity ofmodels and values will qualify as reasonable. ln a late interview,

Berlin raises two principal objections to Rawls' theory. The first is that he cannot accept the plausibility of Rawls' idea ofreasonable overlapping consensus on the principles of justice. 103 His difficulty is that he cannot see why ail reasonable views would agree either on substantial political intuitions or on principles of justice. Sorne reasonable

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persons may see justice as an overriding value, but others may hold different ultimate values, such as mercy, and see justice as a far less important value, and still others may embrace both. Yet these values and the principles they uphold may conflict: "Why it [overlapping consensus] cannot be done is ifjustice is an ultimate value it is [often] not compatible with mercy."I04 Indeed, even where the basic sense ofvalues like justice are very general1y held, they may reasonably be interpreted in many diverse and even incompatible ways. Berlin therefore argues that the diversity of reasonable models militates against an overlapping consensus. Much is recognized in common and sorne beliefs are held very widely, particularly in mainstream discourse. Substantial points of general unanimity, however, are to thin to endorse substantial common principles capable of regulating public life. In arder to attain a semblance of consensus Rawls will have to introduce a criteria of reasonableness which limits relevant views to those which share sorne important beliefs he thinks are latent in the public culture of a constitutional democracy. Berlin's pluralism provides a reason to be immediately suspicious both of the idea that the political intuitions are really are as widely consensual as Rawls thinks, as weIl as ofhis conceit that they are especially linked with what it means to be reasonable and should constitute prerequisites to serious participation in public life. Moreover, Berlin holds that sorne people may not unreasonably be committed to values which not merely do not support, but which actively contradict, the principles of faimess and social arder which Rawls links with being reasonable. Berlin insists that sorne people may not unreasonably or unintelligibly take a "Nietzschean tragic-romantic view" which finds value in deep social conflict or indeed may be committed to the value of "the infliction of suffering" or "sadism."I05 Berlin may not like these latter views, but he thinks it presumes too much to insist that they are prima facie unreasonable - he rather says "1 think that people may have ends which horrify me against which reason is helpless."I06 These are aIl potentially reasonable c1aims, and as such they deserve at least
fair consideration in public reason. Of course, he hopes that in particular cases they can

be shown to be unpersuasive and even incoherent (because they are self-contradictory, empirical1y false, or otherwise deficient), and that those who hold them can be converted to pluralist liberalism. This is part of why it is important to maintain open discourse in the public sphere. If conversion fails, however, and proponents of these perspectives

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threaten liberal societies, they may have to be restrained.

107

However, to dismiss such

views as necessarily unreasonable, is simply to attempt to evade moral responsibility for such hard decisions. Berlin does not only not recognize this essential reasonable-rational distinction to which Rawls appeals as a settled conviction ofliberal-democratic regimes, but more importantly, he does not himself accept it. For Berlin, as for communitarians, we are always bound up with our ultimate or constitutive values of which justice is often (although not always necessarily) one. Values cannot be neatly segmented into public and private without distortion, for both are inextricably intertwined within a single identity. Berlin may assert that we can exercise greater choice over our ultimate ends than sorne communitarians believe, \08 but as with communitarians, there is little potential for deontological abstraction in his very situated, if always potentially unpredictably selftransforming, identity. Correspondingly, for Berlin, there is no sharp distinction between the right and the good, as drawn in Rawls' theory, no abrupt delineation between public and private life, as in Rawls' "political and nonpolitical" identities, which citizens must somehow reconcile. 109 Justice is treated as one among a competing range ofultimate values or Great Goods. When he employs the term rights, as he does on occasion, he means it to express a very basic c1aim to a minimum threshold of a generally recognized ultimate value - my right to freedom of conscience as a basic aspect of negative liberty, for example. 110 Berlin is very c1ear about saying he does not recognize any faculty which allows us to recognize human rights with any finality or certainty.111 The most widely and formally recognized basic aspects of these goods we calI rights to express a difference of degree, of confidence in the strength of our c1aim, not of constitutive type. If, however, the distinction between the realms ofjustice and the realm of the good, cannot be taken for granted as a settled conviction of a (liberal) democratic constitutional
regime, this has serious implications for the plausibility of Rawls' project.

The second critical difference between himself and Rawls that Berlin raises is the irrational impulses of men to which 1 pay attention and Rawls doesn't. 1 think you cannot establish political government purely on the basis ofwhat is rational ... 1 think there are too many irrational drives in men .... Ifpeople didn't have deep

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irrational elements in them there would be no religion, no art, no love. None of these things is justifiable by purely rational means. 112 ln addition then to an integration of the personal and the social, what Rawls distinguishes as the reasonable and the rational, Berlin also wants to leave room to irrational appeals in politicallife - to religion, to art or to love. By irrational, Berlin seems to refer to values that people feel but cannot justify directly on their basic models - such as, why one loves someone or knows that something is beautiful or knows the truth of one's faith. These irrational elements which Berlin sees as integral to moral and politicallife, contrast sharply with Rawls' ambition to empty political foundations of controversial elements. The admission of irrational values into public life obviously begs controversy. Berlin seems to believe that a public life bereft of the irrational would be too narrow to have meaning and force for people. This emphasis on the irrational as integral to human life reflects the strong restrained romantic heritage in Berlin's thought. The first settled conviction, however, suggests an even more important point of conflict, for here is found Rawls' basic liberal principle oflegitimacy, and a point on which his account of the settled convictions rests - the principle ofreciprocity. We will see, however, that this principle rests tacitly on the distinction between reason and rationality, justice and the good, political and morallife. Rawls defines it as follows: our exercise of political power is proper only when we sincerely believe that the reasons we offer for our political actions may reasonably be accepted by other citizens as a justification of those actions. 113 Rawls connects this principle with the idea of persons as free and equal. Many liberals will want to accept this idea as part of respecting freedom and equality as independent values.
114

Nothing about this idea, however, necessarily leads to the principle of

reciprocity as thus defined. Indeed, 1 want to suggest that this will only really seem to be a coherent standard if we already accept an idea of reasoning as bound up with common standards ofjustice. If we do, the principle may carry the meaning that Rawls attributes to it - acting in terms of "mIes and procedures" commonly accepted as right and j ust. If, however, we consider the meaning of this principle, in terms, for example, of Berlin' s understanding of reasoning, then fatal ambiguities and difficulties appear. If reason simply involves being able to offer plausible interpretations for our actions in

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terms of our values and basic models, then what is the significance of requiring that they be "reasonably accepted" by other citizens? If the meaning is taken as requiring that other citizens accept them as they are characteristically offered, as reasonable explanations for our actions in our own terms, but not necessarily in others' own terms, then an enormous number of basic models, values, procedures, rules or guidelines necessarilyaccrue. Indeed, in light of Berlin's strong pluralism, whatever standards might be identified would be so diverse, and potentially conflictual, and indeed in the light of the possibility of unpredictable self-transformation, so provisional, that they could provide no stable and consistent basis for a political concept ofjustice in Rawls' terms. 115 On the other hand, if the significance of acceptance and justification is that they would actually be actively shared by all reasonable citizens, then the category, for the same reasons, appears to be empty, or at any rate so close to empty (and still provisional) that again no support accrues for the political concept ofjustice. 116 If we then add to these reservations the difficulties associated with the fact that the principle of reciprocity does not caU for actual acceptance of our justifications, but merely that we sincerely believe that such acceptance might be forthcoming in the future, something like the full vagueness and ambiguity of the principle ofreciprocity on Berlin's understanding begins to become apparent. Moreover, leaving aside the matter ofreciprocity's precise meaning, it seems very contrary to the spirit of Berlin's thought. Berlin after all writes that "collisions of values are of the essence ofwhat... we are." 117 In insisting on the importance of the conflict of values to modern identity Berlin rejects Rawls' presumed need for the harmonization both ofultimate public values. Indeed, Berlin's primary example is the conflict of liberty and equality. 118 Eisewhere, he writes, " ... too much emphasis on common norms can lead to intolerance and disregard for the inner life ofman.,,119 Moreover, he does not think there is any adequate basis for moral or political consensus or a sharp delineation of
the reasonable and unreasonable:

There are sharp differences on what constitute valid reasons for actions in these [moral and political] fields; on how the relevant propositions are to be established or even rendered plausible; on who or what constitutes recognized authority for deciding these questions; and there is consequently no consensus on the frontier between valid public criticism and subversion, or between freedom and repression, and the like. 120
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Similarly, we have seen that he lays great value on "heterodoxy," "dissent" and "moral independence," and "originality ofjudgment." He wants an "agitated," "untidy," "flexible" public equilibrium. If Berlin is properly understood as embracing pluralism itself as an ultimate value, and indeed seeing it as supportive of freedom, tolerance and civility, and valuable for the range ofvalues-in-themselves it is capable of encompassing, then his thought does not seem to lead to anything like the restriction to common political currency demanded by the principle ofreciprocity. If Berlin's thought is properly understood as concerned with diverse individuals and communities who are constituted by their diverse commitments to ultimate values, it is wholly unc1ear why, or how, he would endorse a principle which limited public discourse to the common norms that, at best, encompass only a small sub-set of values and commitments, and not necessarily those which are really formative. Berlin is interested in the recognition of difference, engagement, and persuasion in regards of ultimate values. Reciprocity seems to undermine all of this. It seems a formula for alienation, for no real sense of membership in terms of what is really constitutive of our identities, for little sense of engagement or identification in politicallife. In essence, if Berlin feels that "collisions of values are of the essence of. .. what we are," then he seems unlikely to endorse a demand that we constrain ourselves to what we already agree on in order to avoid controversy and dispute in public life, particularly given that the cost will often be the opportunity to advocate and pursue our ultimate values which will frequently not be the objects of consensus. For all ofthese reasons, 1 think that Berlin would not likely embrace a principle of reciprocity, either on behalf of the reasonable citizens of (liberal) constitutional democracies or himself. The issues of recognition, engagement, and the unpredictability of the strength of particular values and c1aims in concrete cases all connect particularly strongly to public reason and choice as opposed to general political speech. In rejecting this principle as generally latent in contemporary liberal democratic public life, Berlin wouldjoin a number ofboth prominent pluralists, like Gray, Joseph Raz and William Galston among others, as well as many other thinkers who do not identify themselves
. espec1aIl y as p1ura l'lStS. 121

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This conclusion carries heavy implications for the relationship between Rawls and Berlin, for on Rawls' theory, Berlin's pluralist liberalism will seem unreasonable and even, as Rawls identifies reciprocity as the essentialliberallegitimating principle, illiberal. In a sense, this ends the argument, for Rawls does not see it as necessary to get unreasonable views to embrace his overlapping consensus: "In their case, the point is to contain them so that they do not undermine the unity and justice of society." 122 Nonetheless, l do not think, on one hand, that we have reached the real core of the disagreement, and on the other it is still possible that Rawls could offer grounds for acceptance which might be more compelling from the perspective of Berlin's pluralist liberalism. The success ofjustice as fairness on the second stage of Rawls' procedure, demonstrating that it could be the focus of an overlapping political consensus, provides a basis to claim that whatever concerns Berlin might have about the political conception of justice, it can nonetheless appeal to a consensual foundation ofjustification. In this context it is perhaps apropos to recall Berlin's statement that "Nor does universal consent to loss of liberty somehow miraculously preserve it merely by being universal, or by being consent.,,123 The point is that a fact of consensus is not necessarily the decisive consideration in judging the adequacy of a law or regime. However, with that general reservation established, a number of further considerations arise. One issue is that Rawls himself does not claim that his investigation establishes any actual fact of consensus, but merely that it points to the possibility that a consensus could emerge around the focal point ofjustice as fairness. He looks only very sketchily at three cases - the main Western religious views, sorne utilitarian views, and a pluralist view. 124 Even on these cases, he has to allow that sorne religious views, which he characterizes somewhat pejoratively as fundamentalist (but which others have shown extend to orthodox believers in general)125 - will not necessarily embrace the political
conception of justice. 126 In sorne cases, rnoreover, he is forced to rely on an openly

comprehensive case to support the political conception ofjustice 127 despite his own insistence that it should be viewed purely as a partial, "freestanding" view, connectable without prejudice to the full range of what he terms reasonable comprehensive doctrines.

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Another difficulty arises out of the charge that the assumptions he makes about his test cases, in effect, predetermine his general success - that is, he begins by assuming reasonable free and equal citizens 128 of a well-ordered society, 129 characterized appropriately by distinct, reasonable, comprehensive and public political views. 130 These provisions seem in effect to predetermine the acceptance of at least the settled convictions embodied in the political concept ofjustice. Rawls' consideration of the 'pluralist' position, for example, is limited to observing that although different values may predominate in different domains, citizens hold political values consonant with the political conceptions which normally predominate in a well-ordered society.131 This conclusion is possible because the presumed reasonableness of the views, in Rawls' terms, has already been taken as given, so that there is, for example, an unambiguous distinction between the reasonable and the rational. In view ofthese assumptions, Jurgen Habermas and Margaret Moore pose the question of why of it is even necessary to undertake the formality of the second-step testing. 132 The other side of this difficulty is that, as a number of critics have argued, the provisions of Rawls' conception of reason are so rigorous as to leave many citizens, perhaps even most, out of his consideration. 133 This also leaves Rawls with the problem of unreasonable people, and why they forfeit their opportunity for serious defense of their views in formaI debates over the basic structure of society simply by virtue of rejecting what Rawls sees as reasonable. The issue seems in the first instance to be one of principle, and one that pluralists are sure to raise. 134 The scope of the problem may nonetheless be magnified depending on how many people are being counted out, and whether the views in question are really all that unreasonable in the familiar, non-technical sense of the word - do they seek to incite genocide, for example? It may at least be more plausible to want to constrain formaI public consideration of such views (although this remains contestable). On the first point, many of the critics of the restrictiveness of Rawls' conception ofreason have
argued plausibly that a great many people would be counted out, including aIl sorts of

eminent thinkers. 135 On the second point, while many violent and perhaps irrational views may be included in Rawls' class of the unreasonable, many far more standard views will also be included, by virtue of rejecting the principle of reciprocity (or the account of the person as exercising two distinct moral powers, 136 or not recognizing the

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burdens ofjudgment,137 or not having a reasonable moral psychology138 or not recognizing an appropriate conception of obj ectivity 139 - aIl ofwhich Rawls raises as criteria ofthe 'reasonable person'). Berlin's case, 1 think, shows that, at least in relation to standard usage, such views can be quite reasonable, and even liberal. One final point which can also be raised on this issue is that the intersection of at least sorne criteria of reasonableness (i.e., reciprocity) with the essential principles of liberalism, may suggest that Rawls effectively reads non-liberals (on his construction ofliberalism) out of consideration from the beginning. He then effectively justifies 'politicalliberalism' to 'politicalliberals,' although this is c1early not his intention. This concern about circularity adds an additional dimension to the objection relating to unreasonable doctrines. AlI this said, there seems to be no compelling reason to believe that Berlin' s general objections are likely to be mollified or superseded by appeal to second stage justification - indeed, quite the opposite. The third line of defense of the tight structuring of public reason appeals to its necessity in maintaining stability. This may be so, but then stability does not seem so overriding a consideration in Berlin's thought. From Berlin's perspective, "principles are not less sacred because their duration cannot be guaranteed.,,140 As we have seen, he is anxious that each generation should discover its own philosophieal problems and solutions, and he warns that great liberating ideas in one generation often turn out to be strait-jackets for the next. Indeed, Berlin seems more anxious about securing the flexibility to allow 'unpredictable self-transformation' than about the need to ensure the general stability of values or forms ofjustification. Indeed, as we have seen, Berlin explicitly champions the desirability of a 'precarious,' 'unstable' equilibrium. Moreover,
1 would suggest that from Berlin's perspective, the idea of stability, grounded in settled

convictions and fixed points is itself problematized by the (growing) historicism of Rawls' theory. The more the context is narrowed, temporally or culturaIly, the more room has to be left for deep and even transformative change. Tf, for example. Rawls allows that liberal constitutionalism could be discovered at a given historical and cultural juncture, then why is it assumed that current ideas are fixed and convictions settled "once and for aIl"? To be sure, Rawls cautions against the impression that he is trying to present a necessarily permanent solution. The regime could always, for example, be

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overrun with unreasonable, irrational, mad and aggressive doctrines. 141 Nonetheless, his emphasis on the fixed points and settled convictions latent in the public culture, his focus on the political conception as forming the focal point of a reasonable and stable overlapping consensus which in turn guarantees the condition of reasonable pluralism which is its basis, along with the regulative role of public reason in fixing the public structure ofjustification, and the insulation of core constitutional principles from democratic repeal, all suggest either a core permanence under most foreseeable conditions (as suggested by his "steps to an overlapping consensus,,142) or at least variation within a relatively narrow band (the family ofliberal political conceptions), save for disasters. At any rate, the kind of stability Rawls seems concerned with, and believes is "fundamental to political philosophy,,143 c1early extends beyond any considerations Berlin takes to be essential. This brings us to the final point, and the one that I think leads to the really fundamental divergence. Rawls' overall project, inc1uding his conception of public reason, may be defended on the basis of the importance of uncovering (and re-enforcing) a basis of normative political consensus for a (liberal) democratic constitutional society. This forms the crux of the basic questions he poses at the outset of Political LiberalL'im as well as the crux of his third settled conviction, of "a well ordered society as regulated by certain basic principles held in common." The question this project begs, and a pluralist liberal of Berlin's sort will surely want to ask, is 'why is it necessary that such a society explicitly recognize, and indeed be regulated by, any such common normative consensus? If such a basis of normative consensus has not yet been uncovered, have (liberal) democratic constitutional societies been rendered illegitimate by this defect?' This problem, I think, (surprisingly) is not given systematic exposition in Rawls' text. He seems to take the importance of the goal as given. His underlying assumption, however, can, I think, be brought out by considering sorne of the ways in which he formulatcs his problem, and by taking note of sorne telling remarks in the main text. Rawls poses the basic problem of politicalliberalism in diverse ways, inc1uding, ... the problem of politicalliberalism is: how is it possible there may exist over time a stable and just society of free and equal citizens profoundly divided by reasonable though incompatible religious, moral and philosophical doctrines? Put another way: How is it possible that deeply opposed though reasonable
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comprehensive doctrines may live together and aIl affirm the political conception of a constitutional regime? What is the structure and content of a political . . concept1n th at can gam th e support 0 fover appmg consensus () 144 an I ' [ The second formulation of the question here offers an answer to the first. A stable and just society, divided by incompatible religious, moral and philosophical doctrines may be stable over time if they can aIl affirm the political conception of a constitutional regime. By the same token, if they cannot aIl affirm such a political conception, a just and stable society cannot, or at least may not, continue to exist over time. Rawls then is concerned with fending off instability, and specifically a loss of the capacity of deeply opposed (though reasonable) comprehensive doctrines to live together in a just society. He reaffirms, ... the problem of politicalliberalism is: How is it possible that there may exist over time a stable and just society of free and equal citizens profoundly divided by reasonable religious, philosophical and moral doctrines. This is a problem of 145 political justice, not a problem about the highest goOd. Again the problem is defined in terms of the stability and justice of society. The answer concerns political justice - here characteristically sharply delineated from issues concerning the highest good. Without sorne political conception ofjustice - not a conception of the highest good - society is in serious danger of injustice and instability. What, however, is the source ofthis threat which can only be mitigated by the formulation of a political conception ofjustice grounded in common normativity? The source of danger, in both (and indeed each) formulation is that comprehensive doctrines, although always carefully defined as reasonable, are deeply opposed. The implication seems c1ear that this deep opposition, without a political conception ofjustice grounded in common normativity, threatens to undermine the justice and/or stability of society. The key point seems to be that as things stand, these diverse comprehensive doctrines are mainly reasonable, and consequently they have not,
or need not, undermine the justice and stability of society. Rawls

simply suppose[s] that historical circumstance has so turned out that for the time being at least, the balance of forces keeps aIl sides supporting current [political] arrangements which happen to be just to each ofthem. 146

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The contemporary situation then is a precarious modus vivendi, whereinjust treatment simply happens to re-enforce the reasonability of diverse comprehensive doctrines. If the balance of forces were, however, to shift, or were to be undermined by, for example, unreasonable "salvation religions," then the reasonableness of diverse comprehensive doctrines might be undermined, and consequently the justice and/or stability of society might collapse. If the stipulation of reasonability is removed, or at any rate marginalized, the society is left with comprehensive doctrines that are simply opposed, and which consequently endanger justice and/or stability. The reasonableness of comprehensive doctrines, however, may be secured by uncovering a basis of common normative consensus, and a political concept ofjustice rooted in it, capable of regulating such doctrines justly. The stabilizing conception, however, cannot be framed in terms of the highest good, because this question does not address the common reasonableness of the comprehensive doctrines, and by consequence may itselfbe a source ofirreducible controversy. The sense ofreasonableness, as Rawls stresses throughout the book, particularly in the distinction of the reasonable and the rational, relates to common mIes and principles in the public realm ofjustice, and not the very distinct realm of the conception of the (personal) good. This analysis is affirmed by consideration of Rawls' discussion of the condition of reasonable pluralism. Rawls writes, "politicalliberalism takes for granted not simply pluralism but the fact ofreasonable pluralism.,,147 Pluralism and reasonable pluralism, then, are sharply distinguished, and the latter is generally assumed as characteristic of the societies in question. However, even the admission of the reasonable pluralism of the societies in question creates difficulties for the project ofuncovering normative consensus: Part of the seeming complexity of politicalliberalism... arises from accepting the fact ofreasonable pluralism. For once we do this, then we assume that, in an ideal overlapping consensus, each citizen affirms both a comprehensive doctrine and the focal political conception, somehow related. 148 The reasonableness of pluralism also, however, provides the basis of the project's success. In terms of difficulty, the admission of reasonable pluralism generates a degree of complexity, particularly terminological complexity, emanating from the need to continually distinguish "the public point of view from the many nonpublic points of view.,,149 Nonetheless, it is at the level of the public point ofview, established in the
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assumption of reasonable pluralism, that the normative consensus, the common mIes and procedures, the common settled convictions and fixed points, are to be found, and from which the regulating political conception ofjustice is extrapolated. Reasonable pluralism then, is not "a disaster," 150 not only because it is viewed as a natural emanation of "the exercise of reason under free conditions," but because it produces the conditions for a normative public consensus and a political conception ofjustice rooted in it, which can secure the stability and justice of a (liberal) democratic constitutional society. These institutions in turn re-enforce reasonable pluralism, and prevent its erosion into simple pluralism: the fact ofreasonable pluralism is not an unfortunate condition of human life, as we might say of pluralism as such, allowing for doctrines that are not only [unreasonable and/or] irrational but mad and aggressive. 15 \ Simple pluralism, by contrast, undermines the conditions ofjustice and stability, neither generating the necessary distinction between justice and the good, nor supporting the commonly agreed mIes and procedures which can make for normative consensus - thus it encourages what appear to Rawls as unreasonable, mad and aggressive comprehensive doctrines. Simple pluralism, while it may for a time sustain a modus vivendi which allows for justice and stability, ultimately encourages a stmggle for domination of public mIes and procedures, and consequently promotes instability and injustice. Ifthis analysis of the background of Rawls' project is accurate, then the whole object ofuncovering a normative consensus and extrapolating from it a regulative political conception ofjustice is directed towards preventing the erosion of reasonable pluralism into simple pluralism, which Rawls views as encouraging instability and injustice. This in turn reveals the deep sources ofhis disagreement with Berlin. First, for Rawls, political theory is centrally oriented towards the neutralization or containment of simple pluralism, which is itself evaluated negatively, as a threat to political justice and stability. This leads to a liberalism formulated around an idea of normative consensus capable of resisting simple pluralism. Second, Rawls introduces a moderated concept of pluralism, reasonable pluralism, which attaches to the basic idea of diverse conceptions of the good, or diverse values, an additional and distinct dimension of common commitments to the public mIes and principles ofjustice, unaffected by diverse

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conceptions ofthe good. He argues that contemporary (liberal) democratic constitutional societies, and most particularly the United States, are characterized by a fact of reasonable pluralism. The identification and re-enforcement of a liberal consensus on the political conception ofjustice serves as a means of re-enforcing this condition. Berlin, by contrast, embraces (simple) pluralism itself, in Rawls' terms, as the source ofhis political thought - as the descriptive conception through which he interprets the modern Western condition, and as an ultimate value within his liberalism. Justice is not understood as a realm, or concern or moral power which exists outside of pluralism, or ofthe realm of values generally, but as an ultimate value within a liberal pluralism. As one ultimate value, however, it is subject, as others, to a degree of moral risk of radical and tragic choice. Justice depends on the range of values which are held as ultimate and which are capable of coming into collision with it in particular cases. Liberalism in general then, and liberal pluralism in particular, are not viewed as forming a consensus except in-so-far as they entail agreement on respect for at least negative liberty as among the ultimate values. Moreover, this liberal consensus, at least as far as Berlin's pluralist liberalism is concerned, does not seek to form the exclusive public basis ofjustification of society, but rather is part of a larger unstable, agitated equilibrium which promotes engagement, discourse, mutual understanding, persuasion, tradeoffs and compromise.

6.iv Conclusion
The treatment ofjustice, and the character of contemporary societies will be major issues of contention between Berlin and Rawls, but what is of the essence here is finally two profoundly different approaches to political thought and political liberalism grounded in two very different receptions of pluralism. On one hand, Berlin' s is an approach to political thought that internalizes pluralism as its source and guarantor; on the other, Rawls sees political thought as an effort to externalize and neutralize simple pluralism by distilling the basis of a normative consensus and extrapolating the appropriate principles ofjustice to which it can give stable support. thus relegating (simple) pluralism to the private realm and thus preserving the sphere of authoritative political justification. Similarly, the character ofliberalisms envisioned are sharply different. Both no doubt can be expressed as efforts to respect persons, but they go about it in very different

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ways. For Berlin, respect is expressed through the understanding and recognition and engagement of different whole outlooks, views ofhuman nature, basic models, and the divergent but reasonable ways that these inform moral and political choices. In William Galston's words, "properly understood, liberalism is about the protection of diversity.,,152 Berlin's confidence in the capacity for sympathetic understanding and common reason leads him to define the limits of recognition only at the horizon ofhuman communication, and to champion a public sphere highly receptive to diversity, although not without a loose and flexible structure reflective of the character of the culture or nation as a whole. LiberaIs recognize each other through contestation. Rawls, by contrast, advocates a politicalliberalism which seeks to respect persons in terms oftheir points ofreasonable similarity, and to construct a public sphere which ensures this just respect by enshrining key points of reasonable normative consensus in the institutional structure of public reason. LiberaIs respect one another by constraining themselves in serious public discussion to consensual intuitions, procedures and principles which are considered just. "The crucial thing," as he puts it in the closing chapter of A Theory ofJustice, "is not to use principles that are contested.,,153 Here we have two very distinct approaches to political thought and political liberalism. While they have not always been fully accepted, or even fully understood, both approaches, 1 would argue, have proved very influential, and have helped to shape the traditions ofpolitical thought, not to mention the liberalisms, we know today. Their contrast illuminates two of the important possibilities which continue to confront us. At their hearts, 1 want to suggest, lie two very different receptions of the phenomenon of modern pluralism, and two fundamentally different strategies of recovery from the disasters which seemed to overtake political theory in the West in the first half of the century.

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Notes

Berlin, "Montesquieu," in Against the Current, p. 158. 2 John Gray, "Where P1uralists and LiberaIs Part Company," in Maria Baghramanian and Attracta Ingram (ed.s), Pluralism: the Philosophy and Polilies ofDiversity (New York: Routledge, 2000), p. 86 3 John Kekes, "The Incompatibility of Liberalism and Pluralism," p. 141; also see John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism, p. 199 - 211. 4 John Gray, "Where Pluralists and LiberaIs Part Company," p. 86. 5 John Kekes, "The Incompatibility of Liberalism and Pluralism," p. 145. 6 Joseph Raz, The Morality ofFreedom, p. 1; Quoted on John Kekes, "The Incompatibility of Liberalism and Pluralism," p. 143; also quoted in John Kekes, The Morality ofPluralism, p. 199 - 200 (here a1so see quotation from Jeremy Waldron, "Theoretical Foundations of Liberalism," Philosophieal Quarterly, Volume 37 (1987), p. 127. 7 Matthew Lawrence, "Pluralism, Liberalism, and Overriding Values," Paeifie Philosophieal Quarterly, Volume 77 (1996), p. 343. 8 George Crowder, "Pluralism and Liberalism," p. 292. 9 See Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply." 10 George Crowder, "John Gray's Pluralist Critique of Liberalism," Journal ofApplied Philosophy, Volume 15, Number 3 (1998), p. 288. Il Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 44. 12 Erick Mack, "Isaiah Berlin and the Quest for Liberal Pluralism," p. 227. 13 Marshall Cohen, "Berlin and the Liberal Tradition," p. 225. 14 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 21. 15 John Kekes, "Liberalism and Pluralism," p. 145. 16 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 44. 17 As 1 will argue below, Berlin's particular view of liberalism is incompatible with sorne more conventional forms of liberalism, such as c1assicalliberalism, so that if his particular view is misconstrued as a general view, then it exc1udes cases he seems elsewhere to recognize as liberal. Altemately, ifhis general view ofliberalism is taken as the position he primarily wants to defend (i.e., as his particular view), then Berlin's view will look banal indeed, but also wholly divorced from, and inadequate to support, many values and ends that Berlin seems to want to treat as ultimate for us, such as community and equality and pluralism. It is essential then to keep the context in which pluralism or liberalism are being used c1ear. 18 In other words, there seems no obvious reason to think that Berlin presumes that his personal view is either the sole legitimate construction ofliberalism (and so defines the general category), or that he thinks that all recognized liberal views will conduce to, or even be compatible with, his view ofliberalism). 19 John Locke, Two Treatises ofGovernment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), p. 269. 20 John Locke, Two Treatises ofGovernment, p. 271. 21 John Gray, Liberalism (Stratford, U.K.: Open University Press, 1986), p. 4. 22 John Gray, Liberalism, p. 10 - 5.
1 Isaiah

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Isaiah Berlin, "Liberty," The Power of1deas, p. III - 2. John Locke, Two Treatises ofGovernment, p. 137. 25 Immanue1 Kant, p. 48 - 50. 26 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 219 20. 27 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 224 - 5n. 28 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 224 - 5n, also see p. 210. 29 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 224 - 5n. 30 see Isaiah Berlin, "Kant as an Unfamiliar Source ofNationalism," in The Sense of Reality, p. 232 - 248 - the kernel of the transition is described on p. 242 - 4. 31 Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 82; and Isaiah Berlin, 32 John Stuart Mill could also be included here on a standard reading. Berlin, however, gives a controversial interpretation of Mill which links him with the emergent pluralistliberal tradition, and so in the interests of not getting bogged down in this specifie dispute, l omit him here - see Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 176 - 7. 33 See Berlin's discussion, Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 175 - 181; also on Bentham's idea ofliberty Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 219n and p. 220. 34 Locke: Isaiah Berlin, "The Divorce of the Sciences and the Humanities," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 347 and p. 350; Isaiah Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 562; Isaiah Berlin, "Kant as an Unfamiliar Source ofNationalism," in The Sense ofReality, p. 241 and p. 245. Kant: Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 216 - 7; Isaiah Berlin, "Herder and the Enlightenment," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 390 1; Isaiah Berlin, "Kant as an Unfamiliar Source ofNationalism," in The Sense ofReality, p. 241. Jeremy Bentham - Isaiah Berlin, "Nationalism," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p.583; Isaiah Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will," in The Proper Study of Mankind, p. 574; Isaiah Berlin "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. 8 - 9; Isaiah Berlin, "John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life," p. 177. 35 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 4 - 7. 36 Ronald Dworkin, "Foundations of Liberal Equality," p. 233 - 8. 37 Richard Rorty, Contingency, Irony and Solidarity, p. xiii - xvi. 38 William Galston, "Two Concepts of Liberalism," Ethics, Volume 105, Issue 3, p. 523. 39 Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 308. 40 Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 143 - 4. 41 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 106 and p.
23
24

109.

John Gray powerfully develops this line of argument - John Gray, Enlightenment 's Wake, p. 77 - 8; Beiner deve10ps a parallel argument against "rights-talk" - Ronald Beiner, What 's the Matter with Liberalism, p. 80 - 92. 43 As valuab1e as a means of securing negative liberty as weIl as valuable intrinsically Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlvii, lviii; also see Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 237.
42

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44 For example, Isaiah Berlin, "Kant as an Unfamiliar Source ofNationalism," in The Sense ofReality, p. 237. 45 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 241. 46 Isaiah Berlin, "The Origin ofIsrael," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 150. 47 Isaiah Berlin, "Marxism in the Nineteenth Century," in The Sense ofReality, p. 161. 48 Isaiah Berlin, "Socialism and Socialist Theories," in The Sense ofReality, p. 109. 49 For example, Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 98. 50 Indeed, Berlin emphasizes that liberal values are often internally pluralistic and lead to distinctively liberal di1emmas - see, for example, Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," p. 12 and Isaiah Berlin, Fathers and Children. 51 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 240. 52 Isaiah Berlin and Claude Galipeau "AlI Souls Interview," p. 14 - 5; Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 40 - 3; and Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xliii - liv. 53 Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 109; Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. ] 1 - 4. 54 Maurice Cranston (ed.), The Encyclopaedia ofPhilosophy, NY: Macmillan, 1967, p. 459. 55 Paul Procter (ed.), Cambridge International Dictionary ofEnglish (Cambridge University Press, 2001). 56 Isaiah Berlin, "From Hope and Fear Set Free," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. ] 13. 57 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. xlix - 1and p. lvi. 58 see Michael Sandel, "Morality and the Liberal Ideal," The New Republic, May 7, 1984. 59 For example, Allen Buchanan, "Communitarian Critique of Liberalism," p. 878 - 882; Amy Guttman, "Communitarian Critics of Liberalism," p. 320 - 2; further points of agreement are stressed by Will Kymlicka, Contemporary Political Philosophy, p. 210 - 9. 60 Isaiah Berlin, Karl Marx: His Life and Environment, p. 145 - 58; Isaiah Berlin, "Joseph de Maistre and the Origins of Fasicism" in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 163 - 74. 61 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 90. 62 Evidently, Berlin finds sorne ofthese positions Enlightening - such as Vico's, Herzen's, or even Hamann's - still he draws on such positions selectively. He even criticizes Herzen's somewhat utopian socialism, although as he himself allows (and it seems borne out), there is no one he is temperamentally more attracted to: see Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin,p. 12 - 3; Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 43. 63 John Gray, Enlightenment 's Wake, p. 9 - 10,31 - 3,87 - 104.92. 64 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 123 - 33. 65 Michael Ignatieff, Isaiah Berlin, p. 249. 66 John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 160 - 5. 67 Matthew Lawrence, "Pluralism, Liberalism and the Role of Overriding Values," p. 343. 68 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 132, and p.98. 69 Isaiah Berlin, "On Education," in The Power ofIdeas, p. 214 - 25.

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70 John Rawls, A Theory ofJustice (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 568. 71 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 14. 72 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 175. 73 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xxvii. 74 1 mean to distinguish here between Political Liberalism and the rather different overlapping consensus developed in the "Law ofPeoples," Critical Inquiry, Volume 20 (August 1993). 75 This point is raised by John Gray, Isaiah Berlin, p. 32 and p. 35. 76 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xx, xxi, xli, xliv, xlv, 1,4. 77 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 27. 78 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 226 and p. 241. For Rawls, the sphere of public reason seems to be defined by the intersection of two primary elements - it occurs in "the public political forum," and it concerns "questions of fundamental political justice." Rawls specifies that these "questions are of two kinds, constitutional essentials and matters of basic justice," and apply the public political forum," which may divided into three parts, "the discourse ofjudges," "the discourse of government," and "the discourse of candidates for public office and their campaign managers, especially in their public oratory, party platforms, and political statements." Rawls also sees a moral obligation of public reason on citizens when they vote for public officiaIs or on referenda questions to "think ofthemselves as ifthey were legislators and ask themse1ves what statutes, supported by what reasons satisfying the criterion of reciprocity they would think it most reasonable to enact." (p. 769 - also see Political Liberalism, p. 216) Citizens are also held to be within the public forum when they engage in public political advocacy in general, and thus engage public reason when they touch on fundamental questions of justice and constitutional essentials. (John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 215) ln earlier work, Rawls writes of public reason as relating to the principles for the regulation of the basic structure of society more generally (still apparent in Political Liberalism, p. 213). 1 try to sum this up generally using Rawls' oft-employed phrase 'when debating fundamental political questions' in the public sphere: "To engage in public reason is to appeal to one of these [liberal] political conceptions [ofjustice] - when debating fundamental political questions." ("The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," The University ofChicago Law Review, Volume 64, Number 3 (Summer 1997), p. 776; also see Political Liberalism, p. 214). This sphere of public reason is loosely distinct from what Rawls writes of as "the background culture of civil society." (John Rawls, "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," p. 766 - 8). In case this suggests too expansive an understanding of Rawls' idea of public reason, 1 address the matter of constitutional essentials alone in a later endnote. 79 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 254, and see p. 231 - 40; also see p. Iv. 80 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. lxi. 81 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 233. 82 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. l5ln, 232, 365 - 6. 83 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 10, 226, 241. 84 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xix - xx, 10, 29, 154. 85 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 10 - 3, 140 - l, 144 - 5.

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John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 340 - 55. John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 209. 88 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 18 - 2I. 89 Rawls also refers more loosely at this point to a provision for equal access to offices and positions. 90 For example, John Rawls, "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," p. 774 - 5. 9l Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 112 - 3. 92 See Isaiah Berlin and Bernard Williams, "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply," p. 306 - 7. 93 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 197. 9494 Isaiah Berlin and Ramin Jahanbegloo, Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 143 - 4. 95 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 243, p. xxi (and p. 9 - 10); also see, John Rawls, A Theory ofJustice, p. 218 - 9, and p. 585. 96 Isaiah Berlin, "Political Ideas in the Twentieth Century," Four Essays on Liberty, p. 30. 97 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 1; also "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," p. 777. 98 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 242. 99 Another defense of Rawls against the kinds of objections 1 am going to raise on Berlin's behalf could potentially be formulated on the basis of the limited nature of the public forum and the subject of public reason. Rawls suggests this line of defense when he writes ("The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," p. 768) that "Sometimes those who appear to reject the idea of public reason actually mean to assert the need for full and open public discussion in the background culture. With this politicalliberalism fully agrees." It might then be maintained that in borrowing Rawls' phrase about 'fundamental political questions,' rather than 'constitutional essentials' as the focus of public reason, l suggest too expansive a picture of what public reason covers. While this line of defense is important in terms of its potential implications, 1 do not think it is particularly compelling, and hence is best addressed here. One issue that is raised by this objection is Rawls' narrow construction of the public forum which relegates a great deal which is normally associated with it to the background culture (in part, all that Rawls lists on p. 768, note 13). This leads to an impoverished and rather arbitrary construction of the public sphere (on arbitrary, see p. 767, note 9). John Gray, in particular, forcefully advances this critique. (John Gray, Enlightenment '.'1 Wake, p. 76 - 8). More to the point, however, it is for Berlin the most basic principles such as 'constitutional essentials' which most deeply shape our moral and political action and thought where open contestation is most important, and it is in the political sphere, where people are actually represented, and where public policies are actually disputed and formed, where the opportunity for such contestation is most important. Berlin's continuaI focus is on "ultimate values" and the possibility of their abrupt collision, not on secondary or tertiary values (although these may also collide). In political terms, ultimate values must inc1ude "constitutional essentials," for what can these be accept ultimate values? His whole arguments concerning the importance of feeling represented in the public sphere, of the importance ofplaying out radical and even tragic conflict in public life. Similarly, his insistence on the possibility of fundamentally transformative change,
87

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of great liberating ideas in one generation becoming a prison in the next, needing to broken apart, necessitate the opportunity to 'publidy' challenge deeply established values induding what may be regarded as "constitutional essentials." Indeed, the whole ideal of pluralism relies on the notion there are a variety of ultimate values which could similarly be regarded as constituting constitutional essentials, such as justice, liberty, equality, and tolerance, but which may conflict, and that this conflict forms the essence of political problems. It will not then be very compelling to argue that in the public political forum sorne special hierarchy of "constitutional essentials" should alone carry any weight (as sources ofjustification). This contention also seems to fall astray Berlin' s prudential arguments against monist presumptions as potentially insensitive and even tyrannous. Finally, the idea of a privileged set of constitutional essentials in a narrowly defined public life runs directly against Berlin's argument for the promotion of the mutual understanding of fundamentally diverse moral and political orientations. On this point, it is perhaps most effective to quote Berlin himself: (Berlin, "Alleged Relativism in the Eighteenth Century, in The Crooked Timber ofHumanity, p. 90) 1have argued that Berlin regards the public sphere as the key juncture where such encounters of difference occur. In this way public life contributes to sensitizing citizens to diversity and to nurturing the capacity for sympathetic imaginative reconstruction. If arguments in the public sphere, however, are limited in their framing justifications to principles purportedly already held in common, and protests against such values are held to be without weight, then this whole function is compromised. In essence, it seems c1ear that Berlin's arguments do conflict directly with the exdusively valid "constitutional essentials" or fundamental principles for the regulation of the public sphere, regardless ofhow narrowly this public sphere is conceived. Indeed, there may be independent reasons not to draw it too narrowly. None ofthis, however, predudes the propagation of ground rules for public intercourse, or the recognition of guiding principles, or the like. Berlin and Williams explicitly leave room for basic constitutional principles in "Pluralism and Liberalism: A Reply" (p. 307). The essential point is that these principles must themselves be open to public challenge and potential reconsideration. They cannot, therefore, be exc1usively regulative of public life. 100 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 19, 51. 101 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 100. 102 Galston, among others, makes the argument that Rawls argument involves an imposition of the public self on the private: , "Pluralism and Social Unity," Ethics, Volume 99, Issue 4 (July 1989), p. 711 - 26, especially, p. 722. Now, obviously this charge does not involve a perversion in the Stalinist sense, but nonetheless, there is a reasonable aspect of the self which is being distinguished and linked with freedom properly understood, regardless of the protestations of the poor, unreasonable empirical
self.

Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 112 - 3. Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 110. \05 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes, p. 104 and p. 118; Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. Mckinney," p. 557 - 9. 106 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes, p. 119.
103 104

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\07 Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. Il - 12. Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes, p. 117 - 9; Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 37 - 9. 108 1 think this point is well-illustrated in "Benjamin Disraeli, Karl Marx and the Search for Identity." Here Berlin describes Disraeli and Marx's projects imaginatively reformulating their identities. This does not necessarily requires a wholesale break, but a shift of constitutive focus. Disraeli obviously remained deeply connected with his jewish roots, even flamboyantly so, the point was that he re-constructed what these roots consisted in. Berlin also repeatedly stresses that despite his internationalism an expatriate conditions, that Marx remained deeply German (and indeed hyper-sensitive about his Jewish background). The point is that, as Berlin puts it, one remains attached to one's roots even while rebelling against them. Still, they can be imaginatively reconfigured to a large degree. The reconfiguration of identity, however, is a difficult and perilous process that depends to a degree on the recognition of others and further factors beyond the individual's control. Gray is insists that although he does not say it, that Berlin thinks that both Disraeli and Marx's efforts were futile. On the contrary, 1 suggest that he treats these efforts in a sympathetic light, as at least partially succesful. Both in his essay and elsewhere Berlin treats Disraeli ("Political Judgement') and Marx, as brilliant, larger than life figures, who opened up new social, political and intellectuai possibilities to their times. Ifhe does not approve of aIl they do or say, and notes that their inner lives seem unsettled, this hardly necessitates ajudgement offutility. 109 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 30 - 1, 110 Isaiah Berlin and C.J. Galipeau, "AlI Souls Interview," p. 32 - 5 and p. 44. There is also obviously a specifically legal significance which can attach to rights claims - 1 claim a right in the sense that my freedom to do this in enshrined in the Bill of Rights - but nothing in speaking in this way implies a moral power to distinguish a realm of human rights which is distinguished from reasoning about ultimate values or goods. III Ramin Jahanbegloo (ed.), Conversations with Isaiah Berlin, p. 108 - 10 and p. 113 - 5. 112 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes, P. 113. 113 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xlvi. 114 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 197. 115 Of course, this is not to say that there might not be very general agreement on what Berlin regards as the minimal bases for the maintenance of society, such as the preclusion ofmurder. 116 Berlin certainly allows that there are certain minimum requirements for the reproduction of society - for example, murder and violence must be controlled - and these sort of platitudinous principles will enjoy very general (if not strictly universal) support Isaiah Berlin, "Reply to Ronald H. McKinney," p. 559 - 60; however, these minimal commonalities may be met under any number of different regime types, let alone constitutional structures. Moreover, Berlin insists that these minimums are not enough for a decent life, that government has no choice but to venture into more controversial areas - Isaiah Berlin and c.J. Galipeau, "AlI Souls Interview," p. 32 - 4. 117 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. Il. 118 Isaiah Berlin, "The Pursuit of the Ideal," in The Proper Study ofmankind, p. 10 - Il. 119 Isaiah Berlin, "Introduction," in Four Essays on Liberty, p. Iviii.

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120

Isaiah Berlin, "Does Political Theory Still Exist?" in The Proper Study ofMankind, p.

65. William Galston, "Pluralism and Social Unity," Ethics, Volume 99, Issue 4 (July 1989), p. 721 - 2; Joseph Raz, "Disagreement in Politics," The Seventh Annual McGill Lecture in Jurisprudence and Politics, McGill Law School, March 25, 1999, p. 9 - 13; John Gray, Enlightenment 's Wake, p. 73 - 80 and John Gray, "Against the New Liberalism," p. 13 - 4; see also Sheldon Wohlin, "The Liberal/Democratic Divide," Political Theory, Volume 24, Number 1 (February 1996), p. 116 -7. 122 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xix; see also John Rawls, "The Idea of Public Reason Revisited," p. 766 - 7. 123 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 235. 124 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 145. 125 Stephen L. Carter, The Culture ofDisbelief(NY: Basic Books, 1993), chap. 7. 126 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. ] 70; Leif Wenar, "Political Liberalism: An InternaI Critique," Ethics, Volume 106 (October 1995), p. 42 - 6, especially p. 50 - 1, and p. 55 - 9. 127 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 152 - 3. 128 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 144. 129 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 141. 130 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 140. 131 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 170. 132 Jurgen Habermas, "Reconciliation Through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks on John Rawls' Political Liberalism," The Journal 0 f Philosophy, Volume XCV, Number 6 (June 1998), p. 119 - 26; Margaret Moore, "On Reasonableness," Journal ofApplied Philosophy, Volume 13, Number 2 (1996), p. 167 - 78; and Thomas McCarthy "Kantian Constructivism and Reconstructivism: Rawls and Habermas in Dialogue," Ethics, Volume 105 (October 1994), p. 50 - 4, and p. 58 - 63. 133 LeifWenar, "Political Liberalism: An InternaI Critique," Ethics, Volume 106 (October 1995), p. 42 - 6, especially p. 50 - 1, and p. 55 - 9; Shane O'Neill, "Tensions in Rawls' Liberal Holism," Philosophy and Social Criticism, Volume 22, Number 1 (1996), p. 39 - 43; Michael Huemer, "Rawls's Problem ofStability," Social Theory and Practice, Volume 22, Number 3 (Fa1l1996), p. 378 - 94; Sheldon S. Wohlin, "The Liberal/Democratic Divide," p. 106 - 119. 134 For example, William Galston, "Pluralism and Social Unity," p. 712 - 6; Joseph Raz, "Disagreement in Politics," p. 10. 135 For example, William Galston, "Pluralism and Social Unity," p. 713 and p. 720 - 3; and LeifWeinar, "Political Liberalism: An InternaI Critique," p. 39n and p. 50 - 1. 136 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 81, also p. 15 - 35. 137 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 54 - 8. 138 John Raw1s, Political Liberalism, p. 81 - 6. 139 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 110 - 2. 140 Isaiah Berlin, "Two Concepts of Liberty," p. 242. 141 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xlix, p. 39, p. 65 - 6. 142 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 158 - 67. 143 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xix. 144 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xx.
121

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John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xxvii. 146 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xliii. 147 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xx. 148 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xx - xxi. 149 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xxi. 150 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. xxvi. 151 John Rawls, Political Liberalism, p. 144. 152 William Galston, "Two Concepts of Liberalism," p. 523. 153 John Rawls, A Theory ofJustice, p. 585.
145

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But if it is the case that not aU ultimate human ends are necessarily compatible, there may be no escape from choices governed by no overriding principle, sorne among them painful, both to the agent and to others. From this it would foUow that the creation of a social structure that would, at the least, avoid moraUy intolerable alternatives, and at the most promote active solidarity in the pursuit of common objectives, may be the best that human beings can be expected to achieve, if too many varieties of positive action are not to be repressed, too many equally valid human goals are not to be frustrated. But a course demanding so much skill and practical intelligence - the hope of what would be no more than a better world, dependent on the maintenance of an unstable equilibrium in need of constant attention and repair - is evidently not inspiring enough for most men, who crave a bold, universal, once and for aU panacea. It may be that men cannot face too much reality, or an open future, without a guarantee of a happy ending - providence, the self-realizing spirit, the invisible hand, the cunning ofreason or ofhistory, or of a productive and creative social c1ass. This seems borne out by the social and political doctrines that have proved most influential in recent times.\ - Isaiah Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will"

of issues.

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ln undertaking such a study, however, the dissertation confronted immediate

difficulties, particularly in terms of identifying a persuasive understanding of Berlin's thought. There seemed to be surprisingly deep disagreement concerning both the general character of Berlin' s thought, as well as assessments of its coherence. 1 then proposed to undertake a careful re-examination of Berlin's work, in order that the character and thrust of his thought could be brought more perspicuously into comparison and contrast with Rawls. This represented the second set of issues. For obvious reasons, the investigation of the second set of issues preceded the first.

7.ii Berlin Redux

The exploration of Berlin's political thought in general provided strong support for the following conclusions: (1.) Berlin was a moderate but consistent historicist primarily concerned with the interpretive self-understanding of his own form of life; (2.) Berlin was a strong although somewhat distinctive pluralist who argued for a limited but open-ended range of objectively recognizable ultimate values and for an agitated and uneasy equilibrium of these values in public life; (3.) Berlin focused the bulk ofhis critical energy defending an internally pluralistic range of traditionally liberal values within his agitated equilibrium, with an emphasis on negative liberty and pluralism. He nonetheless recognized that there were other ultimate values, not distinctively liberal, which were legitimate and deserving of consideration and even defense. The core or center of gravity of Berlin's thought can be found in the rivalry of equally ultimate values revealed by the exercise of the sympathetic imagination. This nucleus of Berlin' s thought reveals the profound influence of Vico and the restrained romantics on his intellectual development. These three aspects of Berlin's thought can be framed as addressing three important critiques which have persistently been leveled against him: (1.) that Berlin' s thought was deeply inconsistent, particularly in terms ofhis historicist and universalist accounts of human nature; (2.) Berlin's political thought was underdeveloped, particularly in terms of failing to specify the limits of the primacy of negative liberty and in coming to grips with his own latent pluralism; and (3.) Berlin's political commitments were underdetermined, particularly in terms of failing to find adequate grounds for his

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political commitments (often an alleged priority for negative liberty) in his account of human nature. The moderate but consistent historicist reading of Berlin resolves the apparent inconsistency in Berlin's work by modulating his purported universalism through his hisoricism as imaginative, quasi-empirical generalities. The strong pluralist reading defuses the charge ofunderdevelopment by arguing (a.) that negative liberty was presented as part ofhis range of equally ultimate values, and therefore does not require special restraint; and (b.) that Berlin's deliberate and consistent pluralism itself constrained comprehensive theoretical elaboration due to its emphasis on the equality and interpretive flexibility ofultimate values and their unpredictable relations in terms of particular cases. Finally, Berlin's pluralist liberal thought finds adequate determination in his historicized concept of modern Western human nature, and remains firmly rooted in both liberal and pluralist traditions. The reading of Berlin as a moderate but consistent historicist is developed in chapter 3. The key elements in this view included the idea of cultures and historical periods as unique expressive wholes, and the idea of the sympathetic imagination as a means of partially reconstructing such wholes, and supporting a degree of interpretive understanding. While somewhat distinctive in its particular form, this conception of historicism fits comfortably within the general historicist tradition, as 1 argued in 3.i. Specifical1y, Berlin recognized, as developed in 3.ii, that historical periods and cultures seemed to constitute diverse forms of life, each embedded within its own context, only partially and interpretively reconstructible from the outside with the means at our disposaI, particularly in relation to moral or ethical understanding. He therefore avoids claims ofuniversality and certainty, or what 1have called strict universality. On the other hand, embeddedness within one's own context historical and cultural context, and/or engagement in one's own form oflife, also seemed to preclude certain or neutral knowledge of the objective truth of one's own moral condition. Nonetheless, clearer self-understanding, however imperfect, is the primary purpose ofboth Berlin's historical and philosophical inquiry. Both forms ofinquiry rely on the exercise ofwhat Berlin terms the sympathetic imagination, as developed in 3.iii,

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and both eventuate, whether deployed alone or together, in interpretive understanding, and not in certain moral knowledge. Berlin's historicism thus remains sharply distinct, as argued in 3.iv from the metaphysical variants ofhistoricism offered, for example, by Hegel and Marx. The historical root to self-understanding, in his view, relied first on understanding of other cultures and periods, and their points of difference and similarity with one's own, as well as, second, on a historically informed understanding of the emergence of one' s own culture. This interpretation of Berlin' s basic approach is consistent with the limited use of the language ofuniversality, or more often quasi- or virtual universality and objectivity employed in Berlin's arguments. Berlin's use of such language, as argued in 3.v., remains explicitly tentative, empirically and interpretively grounded, and subject to falsification, or supercession by more plausible accounts, as well as to changes in its subject matter itself. Berlin's approach to philosophical understanding represents, in essence, as argued in 3.vi, a turning of Berlin's basic moderate historicist approach inwards, towards a direct investigation of the often unconscious landscape of basic models of moral and political life and concepts of human nature that shape the contemporary Western form of life. Philosophical understanding proceeds from particular points of troubling conflicts within one's own form oflife. It concentrates on leveraging such philosophical questions, open to neither formaI or empirical resolution, into insights into the background models and basic concepts of one's own time. Like Berlin's historical interpretation, this philosophical inquiry relies on the exercise of sympathetic imagination, on evaluative judgments, and remains subject to continuaI falsification, reinterpretation and supercession. Its very subject-matter appears to be unpredictably self-transforming. By consequence, Berlin was highly skeptical of c1aims to certitude, both general and particular, and therefore limited himselfto the investigation of more and less plausible interpretive c1aims. The main lines of Berlin's political thought are investigated in chapter 4. The first half of the chapter, 4.i focuses on an elaboration of Berlin's strong but distinctive pluralism, centered on a range of equally ultimate values inc1uding pluralism itself. Pluralism thus appears both as a descriptive and as a normative c1aim in Berlin's thought.

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Equally ultimate values may collide in particular cases both incommensurably and incompatibly to produce inescapable radical and sometimes even tragic choices. The section concludes (a.) that Berlin self-consciously embraced pluralism as the core ofhis thought, and (b.) that this pluralism generates an inconducive basis for any special discursive privilege for negative liberty. The second half of the chapter, 4.ii, concentrates specifically on Berlin's treatment ofliberty, and particularly negative liberty. This investigation confirms the expectation developed in the first half of the chapter that there is no special privilege extended to negative liberty that is not shared by other equally ultimate values. While it is true that Berlin argues that the suppression of negative liberty beyond a minimal threshold dehumanizes, this is no less true of other equally ultimate values like justice and positive liberty. Chapter 5 examines the contents of Berlin's view ofhistoricized human nature and the support it provides for his political commitment to a precarious and agitated equilibrium of guiding values in public life. In this way Chapter 5 links together Berlin's moderate but consistent historicism as developed in Chapter 3 and the core of Berlin' s political thought developed in Chapter 4, and shows how the former provides adequate support to the latter. The resilience of this support is explored by considering three of the most important, specifie critiques consistently leveled against Berlin's political thought: the monist rejoinder, the hermeneutical critique and the charge of relativism. The substance of Berlin's view ofhistoricized human nature is laid out in 5.i. The arguments moving from this view of human nature to the precarious political equilibrium are explored in 5.ii, and the three lines of critique are examined in 5.iii - 5.v. The chapter concludes that Berlin's view of human nature provides adequate determination to sustain the reasonability, and arguably even the persuasiveness, ofhis political thought. Finally, it is argued in 6.i that, contrary to important arguments that pluralism and liberalism are generally incompatible and others that Berlin in particular fails to square the circle between them, Berlin's pluralist liberalism remains consistent both with the liberal tradition and with strong pluralism. Liberalism is argued to be itself a highly pluralist tradition of political thought held together by the common thread of respect for negative liberty. Strong pluralism, as we have seen, involves a recognition and embrace

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of a plurality of equally ultimate commitments. Pluralist liberalism then involves a commitment to negative liberty among the range of equally ultimate values which themselves reflect the diversity of the liberal tradition. Berlin' s own version of pluralist liberalism embraces a range of values inc1uding, but not limited to, liberty (in both its negative and positive senses), equality (both ofreasonable opportunity and condition), community, pluralism, justice, toleration and civility. The character ofhis liberal pluralism can, moreover, be described as open-ended and outward-Iooking, seeking to engage and persuade, and potentially to be persuaded. Berlin, moreover, recognizes other ultimate values as weIl which do not seem to be bound up intimately with his liberal pluralist political position, such as truth and sincerity. With this account c1ear, it is possible to return to the two main readings of Berlin with which we began, each with its two distinctive sub-variants. Liberal readings have tended to understand Berlin's strong language as flatly dec1arative rather than interpretive and argumentative, and by consequence have imposed a strictly universal framework onto his work and exaggerated the role ofnegative liberty in Berlin's thought. This reading produces an imbalance among his political commitments, an apparent underdevelopment among the elements, and a distinct lack of adequate justification for his universalist c1aims, and a sense of deep inconsistency with the historicist and romantic elements, inc1uding pluralism, which must nevertheless be acknowledged in his thought. The strong liberal reading of Berlin as a maximal defender of negative liberty captures the strength of Berlin' s critique of monistic forms of positive liberty, and more specifically of communist and fascist political thought, and their underlying theories which he sees relying on perverse forms of positive liberty. To see Berlin as a "coId warrior" in this way is by no means inaccurate. He is anxious to at once challenge the plausibility of Soviet political thought, for example, to expose its conceptual incoherence, and to charge it with its human consequences. It is also perfectly true that Berlin was anxious to defend negative liberty as an ultimate value embraced by many within these nations, and with good reason, and to argue that its suppression was integral to the possibility of great historical crimes committed against many peoples. To overexaggerate this aspect of his work, to read it as a polemical critique of positive liberty and

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lionization of negative liberty leads to an under-appreciation of the range, diversity and subtlety ofhis thought, of the depth and complexity ofhis pluralism, and of the moderation and consistency of his historicism. In essence, the strong liberal reading largely overlooks or rejects the deep 'restrained romantic' inf1uences in Berlin's work. Most troublingly, it generates serious problems of coherence, even contradiction, and underdevelopment, and leaves his thought without an adequate structure ofjustification, as the more serious interpreters along this line have widely recognized. The weak liberal reading of Berlin recognizes and attempts to mitigate sorne of these difficulties by reintroducing sorne of the need for balance and equilibrium apparent in his writing by narrowing the priority on negative liberty to a focus on its integral core but without surrendering the idea that there must be sorne clear and absolute priority. This strategy does allow sorne room for the re-introduction of the wider range of Berlin's characteristic concerns, but still as ultimately subordinate to the core commitment to negative liberty. This permanent political hierarchy of values, however narrowed, still generates the need for a hard, permanent structure ofjustification which runs against the grain of Berlin's historicism, and constrains his pluralism in a manner which produces serious problems of coherence - so that these readings are compelled to attribute strictly universal conceptions of human nature, or teleological theories of moral progress, to his work which it seems ill-fit to bear, and from which Berlin seemed anxious to distance himself. Moreover, even taken at their best they seem to offer only a very weak justification for liberalism - as meeting the standard of respecting a minimum of negative liberty - which could also be met by various non-liberal theories and regimes. Most troublingly, they wind up casting his view as embracing a weak conventionalliberalism and a weak, rather non-descript pluralism, and in this sense they run the risk of trivializing what is really a highly distinctive, original and challenging form of moral and political thought and formulation of liberalism. In particular, the themes of tragedy, moral risk, unpredictable human transformation and ultimate human choice and responsibility receive disturbingly little playon these readings. Pluralist readings of Berlin have also been more sensitive to the deep romantic inf1uences in Berlin's thought, but have on the one hand continued to treat them as

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somewhat equivocal, sometimes latent elements in his work, and at the same time have often exaggerated their implications once exposed, connecting him with the exaggerated absolute pluralism or relativism of the unbridled romantics, and with their overriding emphasis on continuaI human self-creation. These readings have offered much richer accounts than liberal alternatives of Berlin's themes ofpluralism, community, radical choice, tragedy, and historicism. Like the liberal readings, however, these too produce profound problems of coherence, development and justification in Berlin' s work. In particular, pluralist readings have faced grave difficulties in making sense of Berlin' s liberalism. Absolute pluralist critiques or readings of Berlin do capture the idea of tragic conflict, or at least the external variant of such conflict as between people, groups or cultures embracing different forms of life, and finding themselves ultimately and inescapably opposed. The key difference is that what appears as a mere possibility in Berlin's thought has become the universal, or virtuaUy universal, character of aU deepseated conflicts between diverse forms of life. This reading overcompensates for the deficiencies of the first two views by attributing to him an exaggerated view of pluralism as absolute and effectively relativistic. This reading of Berlin fails to do justice to Berlin' s idea of the sympathetic imagination, the perceptible presence of at least a shifting nucleus of quasi-universal values, and the empirical resonance of basic modes of reason across cultures and through historical periods. The continuities may not be perfect here, but readings ofthis type inflate the difficulties to suggest, contrary to Berlin's continuaUy repeated refrain, that a communication, understanding and judgment across cultures, periods and basic models is impossible. Such interpretations are then unable to make sense, for example, of Berlin's critique offascist and communist regimes and their underlying theories, and indeed the commitment to monism in general, which is so central to the first two readings. Berlin himself repeatedly and emphaticaUy distances himself from this view, and indeed harshly criticizes it as a self-contradictory reductio ad

absurdum.
The third reading of Berlin as a strong pluralist has the most potential of the variant approaches. While there is a basis for understanding Berlin's critique of the

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totalitarian regimes and theories, there is also an adequate room within a pluralist framework for appreciating his other central themes, such as historicism, community, moral risk, tragedy, unpredictable self-transformation and the unstable equilibrium in which they are all held. While a number of interpreters and critics have suggested the possibility of reading Berlin in somewhat different ways as a strong pluralist, the only sustained and rigorous development along these lines belongs to John Gray. Instead of exploiting the potential for a coherent and integrated reading of Berlin's thought along these lines, Gray focuses on how Berlin's strong pluralism contradicts and undermines his commitment to liberalism, and Enlightenment values in general. Gray's reading of Berlin is grounded from the beginning on what 1 have termed a radically historicist interpretation, which insists that the most constitutive feature ofhuman nature is its propensity for unpredictable self-creation through choice-making. Gray acknowledges that this represents a step for which their is no clear authority in Berlin's texts. On the other hand, it results in Gray's analysis, in deep inconsistencies and even contradictions in Berlin's thought, and the underdetermination of his liberal commitments. The point to which we come around again is that Berlin is best, most convincingly, and 1 think most faithfully and generously read as a moderate but consistent historicist, a strong pluralist, and a pluralist liberal. This reading provides the best basis for understanding and integrating Berlin's diverse commitments, while supporting and making sense ofhis varied critical excursions. On this reading, Berlin's project culminates in an exhortation to a pluralist liberalism informed by a tragic disposition to moral and politicallife - a sense of contingency in relation to one' s own moral and political convictions, and an openness to the possibility of other, competing yet no less reasonable truths, as well as to the possibility of conflict and the necessity of radical choice in the face of rational uncertainty. He exhorted modem individuals and communities to embrace a degree of moral risk. At the same time, however, it allows room for communication, understanding, and interpretive argument both within and across diverse cultural and historical forms of life. Within his own form of life, Berlin

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embraced and defended a variant ofpluralist liberalism recognizing liberty, equality, community, justice, tolerance and civility as ultimate values among others.

7.iii Two Traditions: Aribitration- and Consensus-Based Liberalism

We are now finally in position to return to sorne of the questions set out in the introductory chapter of this dissertation, beginning with the question of whether Berlin is best viewed as primarily an ally or a critic of Rawls. If my interpretation of Berlin has been at all persuasive, then the answer seems to be that at least in sorne very important respects, Berlin's thought is deeply at odds with Rawls', and provides a basis for elaborating a very general critique of Rawls' concept ofpoliticalliberalism. The clash of these two forms ofpolitical thought is dramatically illustrated by the fact that Berlin's thought, and more specifically his understanding of liberalism will not even be admitted into serious political discussion of public issues on Rawls' view, for it neither endorses what Rawls identifies as the relevant fixed points of consensual agreement supporting normative consensus, nor, more generally, will it meet Rawls' basic liberallegitimating principle ofreciprocity, for it will not be satisfied to argue only from points of preexisting general consensus, but insists on the opportunity to engage with and persuade interlocutors even on their fundamental commitments. At the same time, it seems clear that Berlin's political thought suggests serious difficulties with Rawls' elaboration ofpoliticalliberalism. These problems emanate not so much from the substantial content of Rawls' conception of 'justice as fairness' - that is, the principle of equalliberty and the difference principle themselves, which seem plausible enough claims in and ofthemselves. The difficulty is not that Rawls' view is not a liberal one, for the principle of equalliberty does certainly seek to secure a large degree ofwhat Berlin conceives as negative liberty. Moreover, Rawls' view is certainly a recognizable one, well within the bounds ofhuman possibility, and consequently in Berlin's view worthy of serious attention. The principal difficulties arise from the implausible assumptions of the theory, its rigid internaI structuring of values, and most importantly its aspiration not merely to recognition within public discourse, but to tightly regulate the range of acceptable forms of argument in formaI discourse relating to the basic structure of society, and the legitimate principles to which such arguments can

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appeal even on Rawls' revised "wide view" of public reason. In-so-far as it thus presumptively excludes a wide range of clearly recognizable moral and political views and political claims and arguments grounded in what are in Berlin's view perfectly valid ultimate values, from serious engagement in basic public questions, it appears to exhibit sorne of the features of modem monism that Berlin is anxious to critique. Indeed, in respect of refusing to engage with views, such as those of allegedly unreasonable persons who do not appeal to 'public reasons' as the sole legitimate foundation for formaI political arguments, Rawls' view will appear from Berlin's perspective even as somewhat "uncivilised." Rawls' theory, even on its more historicist reconstruction, appears to give in to what Berlin characterizes as the immature (although quite human) yearning for stable and permanent certainties on which we can confidently rely in our collective life. The sharp contrast between these two views illuminates the distinction between the discreet revivaIs of political thought with which this dissertation began. Both revivaIs were framed as responses to the apparent demise of political thought as an independent scholarly concern in the early part of the last century. This apparent demise was attributed, among other deficiencies, to the absence of commanding works in political thought, and with the seemingly undeniable pluralist fragmentation of political theory into self-serving ideological camps and the seemingly irreducable plurality of objectives, methods and foundational frameworks which became increasingly obvious. Berlin, and more obviously Rawls, both made contributions towards filling the gaps of commanding works. They both exercised sorne influence in inspiring promising scholars to enter this once-neglected field. What emerges most strikingly, however, is the different ways in which the two thinkers responded to the challenge posed by the deepening awareness of the basic pluralism of moral and political outlooks. Berlin embraced strong pluralism not only as the best account of the modem Western condition and as itself constituting an ultimate value for us, but he also made pluralism the source, justification and guarantor of his political thought and liberalism. Rawls, by contrast, sought to dig deeply below the appearance of basic pluralism to reveal the underlying fixed points of political intuition that, through the work of Kantian-inspired political constructivism, could become the basis of a renewed normative political consensus of

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sufficient breadth to sustain a general regulative framework of public life that included a dominant, lexically prior, political principle which took automatic priority on basic public questions. In this way, in sharp contrast to Berlin, Rawls sought to overcome and neutralize the fragmenting influence of moral and political pluralism. This essential contrast can, 1think, be effectively characterized in the following way. Berlin might be said to have responded to the challenge of pluralism by recognizing its strength, internalizing it, and formulating an 'arbitration-based' political thought and liberalism around it, focused on, and indeed contingent upon, continuaI open and dynamic engagement with it. Berlin's political thought and liberalism remained cognizant of the possibility of pluralism, at least sometimes, outstripping the capacity for rational arbitration. Berlin's arbitration-based political thought and liberalism therefore took on a tragic tenor, sensitive to the real possibility of radical choices in public life. Rawls, by contrast, responded to the essential challenge posed by pluralism, with a 'deep consensusbased' political theory and liberalism, which focused on overcoming the challenge by delving below it, and establishing a stable area of normative political consensus capable of supporting a permanent, hierarchical structure of public reason, insulated from the corrosive influence of what he calls simple pluralism, which was then to be confined to a separate sphere ofprivate life. Rawls' political thought and liberalism was organized around the goal of organizing public choice as rational choice. Both visions of political thought and liberalism have deeply influenced their respective revivaIs, and later discourses and traditions, and may, 1think be said to define two important poles of what it means, and what it entails, to be a political liberal. In the event, however, it has been Rawls and the American tradition which is deeply informed by his work, that dominated Anglo-American scholarship in the late twentieth century. Perhaps the English tradition, with a greater allowance for the essential diversity implied by strong pluralism, could be said to have been too fragmented, too diverse and too preoccupied with the difficulties of internaI arbitration, to have exercised much collective impact on its American cousin. There is also a sense, however, in which the dominant American tradition, clustering around Rawls' consensus-based liberalism, is also the more fragile tradition,

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for it remains dependent on the plausibility of the notion of a deep underlying consensus of political (and sometimes moral) intuitions under continuaI threat from the corrosive power of pluralism. Rawls' own widely recognized tactical retreat into greater emphasis on historicism, into an increasingly narrow focus on the American case, coupled with the tight regulation of permissible public reason in regards of basic public issues, may reflect a recognition of the growing threat posed by a stubbom pluralist recalcitrance towards assimilation into a stable normative political consensus. On the other hand, the very fundamental divergence apparent between Berlin's thought and Rawls' re-enforces Berlin's central subversive contention of deep pluralism at least ifwe are willing to recognize Berlin's position as a reasonable one, worthy of serious attention in deliberating formally on basic political issues. This dissertation has attempted to contribute towards such a recognition. Moreover, the recognition of the deep, constitutive divergence between these two influential thinkers, and the traditions which they helped to spawn, calls attention to the long-standing, and seemingly growing diversity of serious political thought in American scholarship - the profound influence of Straussian thought, for example, of neo-Aristotelians and strong communitarians, and, in particular, of value pluralists, none ofwhose basic outlooks or constitutive c1aims seem prima facie assimilable to Rawlsian, or similar constructions of, normative political consensus. In view of this deepening diversity of serious political thought, the job of the dominant stream of consensus-based theorists seems to grow ever more difficult, even while the persuasive case of strong pluralists like Berlin becomes increasingly forcefuL Liberalism, too, and even American consensus-based liberalism, seems deeply divided on the matter both of the sources and nature of normative consensus. Consider Rawls and Dworkin and Rorty. Rawls' sources of consensus are in political intuitions alone (for he regards general ethics as too diverse for incorporation in public reason) and culminate in an overriding principle ofliberty (equalliberty); Dworkin's consensus is grounded on a general ethical model - the model of challenge - because he regards political intuitions as inextricably bound up with ethical intuitions, and his view culminates in an overriding principle of equality ('liberal equality'). Rorty does want to endorse Rawls' idea of public reason, but not on the basis of Rawls' consensus on

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political intuitions, but precisely because of the absence of any such substantial points of general agreement, and the practical threats posed to modern liberals because of such an absence of consensus. On Rorty's view, the best we can hope to do is to agree that we disagree pervasively, and we ought, consequently, to endorse local traditions which carry the promise of protecting us from the worst cases of individual degradation, and hold the promise of protecting our opportunity to continually re-define our private languages and commitments. This looks more like a modus vivendi than the kind of agreement Rawls wants for the 'right reasons.' Assessed in terms of the substantial demands of Rawls' normative political consensus, both Dworkin and Rorty, it seems to me, would fail to qualifY as proposing legitimate liberal political conceptions ofjustice. Perhaps, as Ignatieff suggests, had Berlin 50 years aga taught with Rawls at Harvard, the revival of scholarly American political thought and politicalliberalism would have taken on a somewhat different tenor. Perhaps it still shall. It seems fitting to end this dissertation, however, with an image that 1 suggested in the introduction that is central to Berlin's thought, the image oftwo friends arguing and disagreeing with each other fundamentally on matters of morals and politics. Although they did not teach together at Harvard, Berlin and Rawls knew each other during Rawls' days as a graduate student at Oxford, and enjoyed some lively exchanges ofviews. 2 Although Rawls' ideas were perhaps still formative, Berlin reports him already a formidable interlocutor. Berlin recalls an argument over the status of Kantian rationality, focusing on whether generalization was intrinsic to rationality in general, or whether one could violate generalization and still be rational. Berlin said there were different ways to be rational, and Rawls retorted that some features of reason were basic and universal. Each deployed the arguments, introduced examples, brought their theoretical reflections and values to bear, chal1enging, criticizing, drawing out assumptions. The disagreement revealed deeper disagreement. There was no resolution. But there was understanding, and respect, perhaps even admiration (certainly Berlin expresses it).3 Sometimes reasonable men disagree al1 the way down. For Berlin, that was pluralism, and the source of philosophy, and where it touched on issues of public import, political theory. Sometimes we persuade, sometimes we are persuaded, or sometimes we

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simply disagree. When we disagree fundamentally, we must choose, interpretively, evaluatively, even aesthetically, in terms ofwhat seems, on the whole, the best in light our own best understanding. For the pluralist liberal, to understand difference is as important as revealing common ground, for it reveals others, the range ofhuman possibilities, and through them, c1earer self-understanding.

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Notes

Berlin, "The Apotheosis of the Romantic Will,"in The Proper Study ofMankind, p. 578 - 9. 2 Isaiah Berlin and C.l. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 25 - 7. 3 Stephen Lukes (ed.), "Isaiah Berlin in Conversation with Stephen Lukes," p. 112; Isaiah Berlin and C.l. Galipeau, "Atheneum Interview," p. 25.
1 Isaiah

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