Disability rights activists often claim that disability is not—by itself—something that makes disabled people worse off. A popular objection to such a view of disability is this: were it correct, it would make it permissible to cause disability and impermissible to cause nondisability. The aim of this article is to show that these twin objections don’t succeed.

This paper critically examines the ways in which dominant poly discourses position polyamorists among other queer and feminist-friendly practices while setting polygamists outside of those practices as the heteronormative and hyper-patriarchal antithesis to queer kinship. I begin by examining the interlocking liberal discourses of freedom, secularism and egalitarianism that frame the putative distinction between polyamory and polygamy. I then argue that the discursive antinomies of polyamory/polygamy demarcate a distinction that has greater affective resonance than logical validity—an affective resonance, moreover, that (...) is built on neocolonial framings of polygamy as barbaric and idealizations of polyamory that whitewash its practices. (shrink)

I address the long-standing problem of toleration in diverse liberal societies in light of the progress of same-sex marriage and continued vehement opposition to it from a significant portion of the population. I advance a view that contrasts with recent discussions by Teresa Bejan, Mere Civility, and especially Cecile Laborde, Liberalism’s Religion. Laborde emphasizes the importance of state sovereignty in fixing the boundaries of church and state, emphasizing the priority of public authority and constitutional supremacy. I argue that emphasis on (...) priority needs to be complemented by a recognition of the importance of forms of reconciliation that go beyond ‘mere civility’. Reflections on toleration in the liberal and democratic traditions – including in the canonical discussions of Locke, Rousseau, Smith and Tocqueville, and in more recent political science – have recognized that the health of liberal democracy benefits enormously from the educative and morally formative resources furnished by religious c... (shrink)

A philosophically useful account of social structure must accommodate the fact that social structures play an important role in structural explanation. But what is a structural explanation? How do structural explanations function in the social sciences? This paper offers a way of thinking about structural explanation and sketches an account of social structure that connects social structures with structural explanation.

This paper offers a critical examination of two recent American Supreme Court verdicts, Masterpiece Cake Shop v Colorado Civil Rights Commission and Trump v Hawaii. In Masterpiece the Court ruled against the state of Colorado on grounds that religious bias on the part of state officials undermines government’s authority to enforce a policy that might otherwise be constitutional. In Trump the Court ruled in favor of an executive order severely restricting immigration from seven countries, five of which are Muslim majority. (...) Both verdicts raise important issues concerning fairness and religious freedom. After examining some of the central legal issues in these verdicts I offer a critical assessment of the legal arguments, focusing on how political value judgments played a crucial role in determining the legal outcomes. (shrink)