The Relevance of Virtue Ethics to Normative Political Theory

In the ongoing decade-long debate on distinct political normativity initiated by the proponents of the realist strand of political theory (Rossi and Sleat 2014; Kreutz and Rossi 2023), arguments in favour of keeping moral norms separate from political theorising have faced ample conceptual criticism (Erman and Möller 2015; 2022; Leader Maynard and Worsnip 2018), while realism’s claim about its transformative capacity has not received equally rigorous attention. In other words, more thought should be given to the question of whether moral normativity, rather than, for example, purely instrumental or epistemic normativity (Burelli and Destri 2022) can offer a better evaluative and prescriptive framework for thinking about political arrangements in substantive terms. I therefore hope to address the realists' critique of ethics-first approaches regarding their lack of connection with empirics by arguing that removing the moral basis from normative theorising locks us into viewing political arrangements (political institutions, order, culture, etc.) as freestanding entities with the sole purpose of ensuring social stability, without much concern for improving social conditions. Instead, we should consider political arrangements as an integral part of the social order rather than a separate endeavour. In this context, I contend that theorising about the empirical actualities of politics without accounting for morality may lead to ignoring evidence directly related to moral values, such as epistemic injustice (see also Baderin 2021 and on importance of engaging with empirical data in normative theorising, see Dowding 2020; Perez 2023; Baderin 2023). The cost of doing so leads not only poor description but, by proxy, an inability to devise prescriptive tools to envision change. As I situate my discussion within the framework of liberal thought, I shall argue that maintaining a predominantly descriptive view misses the aim of liberal theorising, which emphasizes the improvement of human conditions as part of its foundational tenets. I will build my case by first analysing the realist account of liberalism, particularly focusing on its primacy of legitimacy (Rossi 2012; Sleat 2014; 2015; Burelli and Destri 2022; Cross 2024) Then, I will introduce a virtue ethical epistemic approach to liberalism and its connection to legitimacy. This will draw upon on virtue epistemology (Turri et al. 2021) and O’Neill’s (1996) account of practical political reasoning regarding virtue. In brief, this paper is about the cost of prioritising purely political legitimacy over some overarching moral principle, such as justice, and the merits of putting it first in political decision-making processes.