Public Reason’s Chaos Theorem[1]
1. Introduction
This paper examines to what extent public reason can serve as an assurance mechanism as, I argue, John Rawls intended it to. A note on terminology: by “public reason” I do not refer to a strand of liberal theories all holding that, understood broadly enough, authoritative commands of a certain type must be justified to all suitably idealized persons in society. By “public reason” I instead refer to the narrower class of norms regulating public discourse in democratic societies: without getting too technical too quickly, public reason requires citizens justify certain classes of authoritative commands to one another usingreasons all endorse. Though related, these two uses of “public reason” are distinct (Vallier2015). As such, this paper examines to what extent public reason – understood as a set of norms regulating democratic discourse – is capable of serving as an assurance mechanism. My thesis is that public reason cannot serve this function.[2]
The structure of this paper is as follows. In the next section I articulate the assurance problem Rawls thought the well-ordered society faced, and how he thought public reason solved this problem. In §3 I link up the literature on public reason’s incompleteness to public reason’s ability to serve as an assurance mechanism. Namely, I argue that the kind of incompleteness most Rawlsians grant is ubiquitous but unproblematic from a normative standpoint is devastating from an assurance perspective: this form of incompleteness makes it possible for citizens to argue for policy conclusions that are favored by their private interests, rather than justice. In response, perhaps the thing to do is structure deliberative democratic institutions such that citizens will always be incentivized to use public reasons to only argue for conclusions they believe are favored by justice. §4 proves that this is impossible by extending the Gibbard-Sattherthwaite theorem. §5 entertains an objection to this paper’s main argument, by refining the idea of public reason. It is shown that such refinement fails.
2. Assurance and Stability
It was not enough for Rawls to offer a model of the just society. Rawls also felt incumbent to show that such a society wouldremain just. Indeed, ensuring that a society regulated by justice as fairnesswould be stablewas integral in justifying the conception of justice in the first place. Upon a close reading, Rawls seems to think there are two kinds of instabilities just societies face. He illustrates both in this passage:
Instability of the first kind is present when, if any person knows that the others will do their part, it will be worth his while not to do his: the consequences of one person’s not doing his part if others do theirs may go unnoticed, or may have no ostensible effect, so that an alternative use of one’s time and efforts is a personal gain… Instability of the second kind is present when it is the case that if any one person knows or reasonably supposes that others will not do their part, it will be worth his while to be the first, or among the first, not to do his, or even dangerous for him not to be (Rawls 1963/1999: 104).
The first kind of instability Rawls refers to is a Prisoner’s Dilemma, illustrated in Figure 1. In this game, Althea most prefers to act unjustly while Bertha acts justly and vice versa; Althea and Bertha next most prefer mutual adherence to justice; the third most preferred outcome is where both act unjustly; and finally, Althea and Bertha’s least preferred outcome is where they act justly and the opposing player acts unjustly, making thema sucker. The only equilibrium in this game is where both players act unjustly, achieving the Pareto inefficient (2, 2) payoff. Absent intervention, rational players playing Prisoner’s Dilemmas with one another will not do as justice requires.
BerthaAct Justly / Act Unjustly
Althea / Act Justly / 3, 3 / 1, 4
Act Unjustly / 4, 1 / 2, 2
Figure 1
The second kind of instability Rawls refers to is an assurance dilemma, illustrated in Figure 2. In this game, both Althea and Bertha most prefer to act justly, which already differs from the Prisoner’s Dilemma. Althea’s second most preferred outcome is where she acts unjustly and Bertha does not, and vice versa; the third most preferred outcome for both players is where both act unjustly; and each players’ least preferred outcome is where she acts justly while the other player acts unjustly, once again making them a sucker. In assurance games there are two equilibria: a Pareto efficient equilibrium where both Althea and Bertha act justly, achieving the (3, 3) payoff, and a risk-dominant equilibrium where both Althea and Bertha act unjustly, achieving the (1, 1) payoff. Even though acting justly is an equilibrium strategy in this game, and even though mutual adherence to justice yields the efficient equilibrium, it is by no means obvious that rational players will play such a strategy: the slightest doubt that Bertha will act justly can force Althea to act unjustly so as to avoid the sucker payoff, where she acts justly and Bertha acts unjustly (Aumann 2000). Brian Skyrms nicely summarizes the problem: “There is an incentive to avoid unilateral deviation, but, for example, if you expect me to deviate, you might believe you would be better off deviating as well. And if I believe that you have such beliefs, I may expect you to deviate and by virtue of such expectations deviate myself” (Skyrms 2004: 51).
BerthaAct Justly / Act Unjustly
Althea / Act Justly / 3, 3 / 0, 2
Act Unjustly / 2, 0 / 1, 1
Figure 2
On my reading of Rawls, the first threat of instability (the Prisoner’s Dilemma) occurs first, followed by the second threat of instability (the assurance problem) once the first threat of instability has been removed. To solve the Prisoner’s Dilemma, something about the game mustchange because the only equilibrium solution is unjust behavior: we need to alter the game in some way so that just behavior is now an equilibrium strategy. Rawls accomplishes this within his framework by arguing that citizens in the well-ordered society develop a sense of justice via a three-stage developmental process (Rawls 1971: ch. 8). Once the sense of justice has been inculcated there is a“desire to do what is just,” such that“no one wishes to advance his interests unfairly to the disadvantage of others; this removes instability of the first kind” (Rawls 1971: 497).
But we are not out of the woods yet. As Rawls notes, “even with a sense of justice men’s compliance with a cooperative venture is predicated on the belief that others will do their part; citizens may be tempted to avoid making a contribution when they believe, or with reason suspect, that others are not making theirs” (Rawls 1971: 336). That is, even after we have extricated ourselves from the Prisoner’s Dilemmawe still face the assurance problem. Though citizens want to do what is just due to their sense of justice, they do not want to do what is just at any cost. If Bertha does not act justly then Althea does not want to act justly either; and if Althea does not act justly then Bertha most prefers to act unjustly as well. To solve this problem, Althea and Bertha need some way of assuring one another that they will play the act justly equilibrium, rather than play the act unjustly equilibrium.
On one reading of Rawls’s later thought, the assurance problem is solved by public reason (Weithman 2010: 327; Weithman 2015; Hadfield and Macedo 2012).This might not be obvious, because public reason seems to have a normative purpose. The liberal principle of legitimacy, Rawls tells us, requires we exercise political power in a manner justifiable to all. This creates a “moral, not a legal, duty” – the duty of civility – which requires citizens “be able to explain to one another… how the principles and policies they advocate and vote for can be supported by the political values of public reason” (Rawls 1993/2005: 217). This normative function aside, public reason also serves a practical role: when Althea appeals to strictly public reasons in her discourse rather than reasons taken from her comprehensive doctrine, she signals commitment to justice over her private interests. This assures Bertha that Althea will act justly. And when Bertha uses strictly public reasons in her discourse with Althea rather than reasons taken from her comprehensive doctrine, she assures Althea that she will act justly as well by signaling her commitment to the political conception of justice over her own private interests. On Rawls’s model, then, citizens achieve the efficient (3, 3) equilibrium rather than the risk-dominant (1, 1) equilibrium because citizens adhere to the ideal of public reason when engaged in democratic discourse. When this occurs, the second kind of instability is removed.
3. Two Kinds of Incompleteness, Two Kinds of Assurance Breakdowns
We now examine the relationship between the completeness of public reason and public reason’s ability to serve as an assurance mechanism. By completeness, I mean public reason’s ability to give an answer to all questions to which it is supposed to apply. If public reason is incomplete then it does not provide citizens the means to answer some questions that citizens are supposed to answer with public reasons alone. Though there is a large literature examining to what extent (i) the incompleteness of public reason likely obtains, and (ii) how damning incompleteness really is when it does obtain, no one has yet examined the relationship between incompleteness and assurance. The purpose of this section is to argue that the one kind of incompleteness those in the literature (iii) agree will occur quite frequently, but (iv)do not think is normatively problematic, is incredibly problematic from an assurance perspective. Granting (iii), this casts serious doubt on public reason’s ability to serve as an assurance mechanism.
3.1 Indeterminacy.
Following Schwartzman (2004) who follows Gaus (1996), we can distinguish between two different ways public reason can be incomplete. The first kind of incompleteness is calledindeterminacy. Public reason is indeterminate if citizens do not have sufficient reasons to adjudicate between different options they are confronted with in the public sphere. More formally, suppose r1, r2, r3,…,rn are the public reasons available to citizens. Suppose citizens face policy options p1 and p2. Public reason is indeterminate if, taking all r1-rn into consideration, citizens cannot muster a sufficiently rigorous argument for either p1 or p2.
Here’s an example of public reason’s indeterminacy. Suppose, following some, that public reason should apply to all political questions where citizens exercise coercive power over one another (Quong 2004). Here is one such question that must be answered: what should the monetary policy of the Federal Reserve be? Ought the Fed adopt some form of quantitative easing, or ought they stick with strict monetarism? Since public reasons include positive as well as normative considerations, and since these positive considerations must be “found in common sense,” must be “not controversial,” and must be “plain truths now widely accepted, or available, to citizens generally,” it is doubtful that citizens can answer this particular policy question with public reasons alone (Rawls 1993/2005: 224-225). Given this indeterminacy, citizens will need to appeal to considerations that are not public reasons to adjudicate the relevant dispute. For this particular question, public reason is indeterminate.
Because citizens must appeal to non-public reasons in adjudicating those matters for which indeterminacy obtains it follows that there will be some questions where citizens will not give other citizens reasons that are justifiable to them and, more relevant to our concerns, there will be some questions where citizens will not be able to assure their fellow citizens that they remain faithful to the political conception of justice. If Althea gives an argument for p1 over p2, and must appeal to non-public reason r` from her comprehensive doctrine because public reasons r1-rn are insufficient to justify either p1 or p2, then Bertha might interpret Althea’s appeal to r` as signaling fidelity to Althea’s private interests over the political conception of justice. Given this signal, Bertha, wanting to avoid the sucker payoff from Figure 2, might end up acting unjustly in anticipation of Althea acting unjustly. Assurance has thus broken down. Because of public reason’s indeterminacy, there will be times when Althea and Bertha simply cannot appeal to public reasons; since public reasons are meant to assure other citizens, it follows that there will be times when Althea and Bertha cannot assure one another.
Now whether incompleteness in the form of indeterminacy is a big problem for public reason as an assurance mechanism depends on how often indeterminacy obtains: given that Althea and Bertha engage in repeated interactions, Althea’s not adhering to public reason in one interaction would not be sufficient to spook Bertha into acting unjustly if Althea adheres to public reason in most other interactions. But, if indeterminacy is the rule and not the exception, then indeterminacy undermines public reason’s assurance function: if, for the majority of political questions, there are insufficient public reasons for adjudicating the matter at hand, then assurance will likely breakdown, leading us to the inefficient equilibrium where everyone acts unjustly.
Hence the fundamental question: how likely is it that incompleteness in the form of indeterminacy obtains? Fortunately, many in the literature think that indeterminacy will be a rather rare problem for public reason. Schwartzman (2004: 205-208) offers compelling argument as to why indeterminacy will be the exception rather than the rule. Here we will grant that Schwartzman is correct;doing so entails that incompleteness in the form of indeterminacy is not a problem for public reason as an assurance mechanism. The reason we do this is because we do not want the critique of public reason as an assurance mechanism to rest on controversial speculation concerning how often certain phenomena occur. Thus, we grant the defender of public reason everything they grant themselves.In the next section we examine a kind of incompleteness that most hold is ubiquitous.
3.2Inconclusiveness.
The second kind of incompleteness is inconclusiveness. Public reason is inconclusive if there are competing public reason-based justifications for a given political question that do not dominate one another. More formally, suppose r1, r2, r3,…,rn are the public reasons available to citizens. Suppose citizens face policy options p1 and p2. Public reason is inconclusive if, taking all r1-rn into consideration, citizens can muster sufficiently rigorous arguments for bothp1andp2, such that we cannot judge the argument for p1 to be better than the argument for p2or vice versa. Unlike indeterminacy, inconclusiveness does allow us to actually argue for different policy options using strictly public reasons; the problem now, though, is that public reasonsdo not end the argument. Public reasons can be called upon to muster support for both p1 and p2 – in such a case, public reason alone does not settle the matter at hand.
Unlike indeterminacy, it is not clear that inconclusiveness ends up requiring citizens appeal to non-public reasons. Instead, after citizens give public reasons in defense of their preferred policies – and, by hypothesis, the matter has yet to be solve – there are other ways of adjudicating the disagreement: we can just hold a simple majority vote between p1 and p2, for instance.Contra cases of indeterminacy, in cases of inconclusiveness political matters can be settled without appealing to non-public reasons (Schwartzman 2004: §3). Since Rawls’s general worry is that the use of non-public reasons signals fidelity to private interests over the political conception of justice, and since cases of inconclusiveness do not require citizens appeal to non-public reasons, it might be thought that inconclusiveness – unlike indeterminacy – does not threaten public reason’s ability to function as an assurance mechanism.
This is incorrect. The worry with inconclusiveness is that citizens might not be using public reasons to argue for conclusions they believe to be favored by justice, but rather are arguing for conclusions that are favored by their private interests. For example, suppose Althea thinks one of the policy options (either p1 or p2) is favored by the political conception of justice, but the other policy option not favored by justice is favored by her comprehensive doctrine. Assuming that public reason is inconclusive in this case, public reasons r1-rnsupport both p1 and p2. The worry is that, when Althea argues for either p1 or p2 with strictly public reasons, she mightbe merely trying to advance her own private interests rather than the demands of justice. If Bertha suspects as much then she might try to be the first to act unjustly in order to avoid the sucker payoff – if Althea is not to be guided by justice in her public deliberators then she does not wish to be either. Note, this problem does not arise if inconclusiveness does not obtain. If the public reasons available entail one and only conclusion then Bertha cannot doubt the conclusion Althea reaches with public reasons. It is only when public reason supports multiple conclusions that we are led to an assurance breakdown.[3]