Review by Choice Review
Building on critiques of Hayek, Rawls, and Walzer, this work offers "democratic liberalism" as a solution to the problem of moral pluralism in modern society. In contrast to much of contemporary liberalism, Bellamy (Univ. of Reading, UK) rejects the idea of a constitution specifying fundamental rights and democratic processes that at least ideally serves to limit political conflict. Democratic liberalism draws on republican conceptions of politics and advances a broad understanding of the political in which even constitutional essentials are decided through on-going democratic negotiation and compromise. A strength of the work is its discussion of different forms and strategies of political compromise. The abstract argument is made concrete by using it to analyze three major areas of current political debate in the UK. The writing is clear and accessible to advanced undergraduates, though its primary readership is likely to be at the graduate and faculty or research level. The work contributes to a large literature examining how liberal democracies can cope with deep moral conflict, such as Amy Gutmann and Dennis Thompson's Democracy and Disagreement (CH, Feb'97), but its contribution is limited by weaknesses in its analysis of key ideas (notably, "pluralism"). ; Wesleyan University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
