Toward an ethics of the encounter: William James's push beyond tolerance

Something in the world forces us to think. This something is an object not of recognition but of a fundamental encounter.The Deweyan call for democracy as a way of life is a call to bring together ethics and politics. There is the temptation to think of this vision of democracy as a single "way of life"—an ethos with well-defined values such that the democratic thinker, the democratic community, and the democratic citizen can be identified as living out this democratic way of life. However, it is important not to misconstrue the radical nature of Dewey's conception of democratic ethics.The challenge of producing a philosophical account of a democratic ethics is not, as in a more traditional approach to ethics, to ..