Is mercy more important than justice?
Since antiquity, mercy has been regarded as a virtue. The power of monarchs was legitimated by their acts of clemency, their mercy demonstrating their divine nature. Yet by the end of the eighteenth century, mercy had become "an injustice committed against society . . . a manifest vice." Mercy was exiled from political life. How did this happen?
In this book, Malcolm Bull analyses and challenges the Enlightenment's rejection of mercy. A society operating on principles of rational self-interest had no place for something so arbitrary and contingent, and having been excluded from Hobbes's theory of the state and Hume's theory of justice, mercy disappeared from the lexicon of political theory. But, Bull argues, these idealised conceptions have proved too limiting. Political realism demands recognition of the foundational role of mercy in society. If we are vulnerable to harm from others, we are in need of their mercy. By restoring the primacy of mercy over justice, we may constrain the powerful and release the agency of the powerless. And if arguments for capitalism are arguments against mercy, might the case for mercy challenge the very basis of our thinking about society and the state?
An important contribution to contemporary political philosophy from an inventive thinker, On Mercy makes a persuasive case for returning this neglected virtue to the heart of political thought.
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On Mercy
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Information
Publisher
Princeton University PressYear
2019Print ISBN
9780691217451
9780691165332
eBook ISBN
9780691185736
Topic
PhilosophySubtopic
Ethics & Moral Philosophy
1
In
De
clementia
Seneca
emphasised
that
mercy
pre-
supposes
a
radical
asymmetry
between
the
person
who
grants
it
and
the
person
who
receives
it.
at
asym-
metry
is
not
necessarily
a
function
of
status;
mercy
is
the
prerogative
of
anyone
whom
fortune
has
favoured
in
the
struggle
for
power.
However,
the
power
to
grant
mercy
will
more
consistently
be
found
in
a
public
than
a
private
context,
and
‘in
rulers
it
has
an
especial
comeliness’.
1
e
claim
had
a
history
behind
it.
In
the
early
Roman
republic,
mercy
had
played
little
role,
save
when
granted
to
the
vanquished
by
Roman
generals
in
foreign
wars.
During
the
civil
wars,
however,
it
was
self-conciously
adopted
as
an
instrument
of
policy
by
Julius
Caesar,
who
offered
clemency
to
his
defeated
Roman
enemies
just
as
he
had
earlier
done
to
the
Gauls.
2
is
was
usually
accepted,
though
for
men
of
high
status
it
posed
a
dilemma:
to
accept
mercy
was
Table of contents
- Cover Page
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction
- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Chapter 4
- Notes
- Index
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Yes, you can access On Mercy by Malcolm Bull in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Philosophy & Ethics & Moral Philosophy. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.