The Ethics, Epistemology, and Politics of Richard Rorty

307 Pages·2021·6.156 MB·English

by  Giancarlo Marchetti (editor)

“Now that the dust has largely settled on many of the debates he insti-
gated during his distinguished career, the time has come for a reassess-
ment of the philosophy of Richard Rorty. This extraordinary collection
helps us to see better the force, and in some cases the systematic nature,
of Rorty’s work in ethics, epistemology and politics. The fourteen essays
assembled here will provide essential touchstones for those who wish to
follow the intellectual paths cleared by Rorty’s pragmatism.”
— Robert B. Talisse, W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy,
Vanderbilt University, USA
“A perceptive and lively revisiting of Rorty’s signifcance for our time:
epistemology, language, radical social criticism, race, jurisprudence and
law, the livability of philosophy, literature and politics, 20th century
philosophy, relativism, and, above all, pragmatism.”
— Juliet Floyd, Boston University, USA
“Richard Rorty was the most original, and in many ways the most ambi-
tious philosopher of his generation. The “pragmatism after the linguistic
turn” that he championed aspired to be a full-blooded alternative not
only to dominant strands in the analytic tradition in Anglophone philos-
ophy in which he began his career, but to the continental tradition which
he also knew well. This collection of essays by an impressive group of
philosophers highlights the range of Rorty’s thought and substantially
deepens our understanding of it.”
— Robert B. Brandom, University of Pittsburgh, USA
“This volume brings together a group of seasoned scholars of Rorty’s
work with a number of junior scholars striking important new ground
through his writings. These contributions place Rorty in conversation
with crucial themes in contemporary philosophical ethics, epistemology,
and political theory: these topics range from representationalism, lin-
guistic pragmatism, and realism (both epistemological and metaethical)
to metaphilosophy and the diversifcation of the discipline to legal prag-
matism, social critique, and the politics of racial inequality. This volume
will serve readers well as a guide to Rorty’s relevance for contemporary
philosophy. In doing so it achieves a central aim of Rorty’s thought: that
of keeping the philosophical conversation going.”
— Colin Koopman, Philosophy and New Media & Culture,
U niversity of Oregon, USA
“Few, if any, contemporary philosophers can match Rorty’s combination
of breadth and depth. His work, which ranges from epistemology, phi-
losophy of mind, and philosophy of language to ethics and politics, com-
bines acute analytic insight with a deep sense both of philosophy’s past
and its future possibilities. In a time when much Anglophone philosophy
is increasingly scholastic, Rorty’s work stands as a shining of example
of what philosophy can be. This collection of essays is essential reading
for anyone who wants not only to understand Rorty’s work but to build
on his legacy.”
— Michael Williams, Johns Hopkins University, USA
“This expertly curated collection of 14 essays by European and Amer-
ican scholars signifcantly expands our understanding of the infuence
of Richard Rorty on late twentieth and early twenty-frst century phi-
losophy. These wide-ranging contributions examine Rorty’s complex
connections to analytic philosophy, pragmatism, literature, education,
political thought, legal theory, and much else. Together, they project
new directions for Rorty studies.”
— Larry A. Hickman, Director Emeritus, Center for Dewey
Studies, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, USA
The Ethics, Epistemology, and
Politics of Richard Rorty
This book features fourteen original essays that critically engage the phi-
losophy of Richard Rorty, with an emphasis on his ethics, epistemology,
and politics. Inspired by James’ and Dewey’s pragmatism, Rorty urged
us to rethink the role of science and truth with a liberal-democratic vision
of politics. In doing so, he criticized philosophy as a sheer scholastic en-
deavor and put it back in touch with our most pressing cultural and  hu-
man needs. The essays in this volume employ the conceptual tools and
argumentative techniques of analytic philosophy and pragmatism  and
demonstrate the relevance of Rorty’s thought to the most urgent ques-
tions of our time. They touch on a number of topics, including but not
limited to structural injustice, rule-following, Black feminist philosophy,
legal pragmatism, moral progress, relativism, and skepticism. This book
will be of interest to a wide range of scholars across disciplines who are
engaging with the work of Richard Rorty.
Giancarlo Marchetti is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Pe-
rugia, Italy. He is the author of Il neo-pragmatismo (1999) and Verità
e valori. Tra pragmatismo e flosofa analitica (2008), and co-editor of
Il Pragmatismo. Dalle origini agli sviluppi contemporanei (2015) and
Facts and Values: The Ethics and Metaphysics of Normativity (Rout-
ledge, 2017).
Routledge Studies in American Philosophy
Edited by Willem deVries, University of New Hampshire,
USA and Henry Jackman, York University, Canada
Wilfrid Sellars and Twentieth-Century Philosophy
Edited by Stefan Brandt and Anke Breunig
Challenging the New Atheism
Pragmatic Confrontations in the Philosophy of Religion
Aaron Pratt Shepherd
John Dewey’s Ethical Theory
The 1932 Ethics
Edited by Roberto Frega and Steven Levine
The Philosophy of Ralph Waldo Emmerson
Joseph Urbas
Pragmatism and Social Philosophy
Exploring a Stream of Ideas from America to Europe
Edited by Michael G. Festl
C. I. Lewis
The A Priori and the Given
Edited by Quentin Kammer, Jean-Philippe Narboux,
and Henri Wagner
Charles Peirce on Ethics, Esthetics and the Normative Sciences
James Jakób Liszka
The Ethics, Epistemology, and Politics of Richard Rorty
Edited by Giancarlo Marchetti
For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.routledge.
com/Routledge-Studies-in-American-Philosophy/book-series/RSAP
The Ethics, Epistemology,
and Politics of Richard Rorty
Edited by
Giancarlo Marchetti
First published 2022
by Routledge
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Marchetti, Giancarlo, editor.
Title: The ethics, epistemology, and politics of Richard Rorty /
edited by Giancarlo Marchetti.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY :
Routledge, [2022] |
Series: Routledge studies in American philosophy | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021032705 (print) | LCCN 2021032706
(ebook) | ISBN 9780367342173 (hbk) | ISBN 9780429324734
(pbk) | ISBN 9781032128788 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Rorty, Richard. | Ethics. | Knowledge,
Theory of. | Political science—Philosophy.
Classification: LCC B945.R524 E84 2022 (print) |
LCC B945.R524 (ebook) | DDC 191—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021032705
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021032706
ISBN: 978-0-367-34217-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-12878-8 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-32473-4 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9780429324734
Typeset in Sabon
by codeMantra
Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xi
The Philosophy of Richard Rorty 1
GIANCARLO MARCHETTI
PART I
Ethics 27
1 Rorty as Liberal Ironist Peace Warrior 29
SHARYN CLOUGH
2 The Rorty-Dworkin Debate 50
RAFF DONELSON
3 Bildung, Unimportance, and Moral Progress 64
SARIN MARCHETTI
4 Philosophy, Literature, Politics: The Cases of Rorty and
Collingwood 83
SABINA LOVIBOND
PART II
Epistemology 101
5 What Should Rorty Say about Relativism? 103
CAROL ROVANE
6 Rorty’s Reconstruction of Epistemology 129
ROSA M. CALCATERRA
viii Contents
7 Rorty and Experience 148
CHRIS VOPARIL
8 Richard Rorty, Rocks, and Realism 168
MARIANNE JANACK
9 Disepistemology 180
BARRY ALLEN
PART III
Politics 189
10 Rorty, Habermas, and Radical Social Criticism 191
MICHAEL BACON AND NAT RUTHERFORD
11 Thinking with Rorty about How to Make
Philosophy more Livable 209
SUSAN DIELEMAN
12 Poetic Justice?: Rorty’s Jurisprudence 226
WILLIAM M. CURTIS
13 Pragmatism and the Mirror of Law 245
DOUGLAS LIND
14 Achieving Whose Country? Rorty and Baldwin
on the United States 266
SHANNON SULLIVAN
List of Contributors 283
Index 287
Preface
Fourteen years have passed since the death of one of the twentieth-
century American philosophy’s most infuential, provocative, and dis-
tinctive voices. Interest in Richard Rorty’s pragmatism is nonetheless
experiencing a resurgence. He is enjoying a thorough re-evaluation
thanks to a new generation of American philosophy scholars. This is de-
cisively signifcant. For, thanks to his diverse philosophical interests and
inimitable charisma, Rorty became an ardent spokesperson for a post-
philosophical culture. Worldwide attention along with a re-e valuation
of Rorty’s work in recent years is evidenced by the sheer number of
new monographs, anthologies, and articles devoted to his work. There
is even a new volume of his previously unpublished philosophical pa-
pers, courses, and conferences. This continuing international interest in
Rorty’s philosophy testifes both to his originality and fruitfulness. In-
deed, Rorty is considered to be amongst the most original and prominent
philosophers of twentieth-century American philosophy. His subversive
thought, however, engenders fruitful discussions that stimulate mutual
understanding, breaking new ground through novel ideas and insights.
The present volume comprises new essays that combine leading and
emerging voices ones in contemporary philosophy, critically examining
and refecting upon the infuence of Rorty’s thought, giving particular
attention to his ethics, epistemology, and politics. This broad-ranging
study employs the conceptual tools and argumentative methods of both
analytic philosophy and pragmatism.
This book is divided into three broad sections: “Ethics” (Sharyn
Clough, Raff Donelson, Sarin Marchetti, and Sabina Lovibond); “Epis-
temology” (Carol Rovane, Rosa M. Calcaterra, Chris Voparil, Mari-
anne Janack, and Barry Allen); and “Politics” (Michael Bacon and Nat
Rutherford, Susan Dieleman, William M. Curtis, Douglas Lind, and
Shannon Sullivan). Under these three headings are essays concerning
three crucial and interconnected topics.
Giancarlo Marchetti