![Sample our Humanities journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5939/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Humanities.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
Isaiah Berlin’s idea of value pluralism has been extensively discussed in recent decades. However, there is still much controversy about the actual meaning and implication of the terms “incompatibility” and “incommensurability” when applied to values. This article analyses the Berlinian concept of value pluralism from a theoretical point of view and argues that, following Berlin’s work, incompatibility should be defined as the impossibility of two ends being combined at a maximum level―though it is possible to find compromises between them when not pursued to their maximum―whereas incommensurability refers to the existence of more than one valid, rational solution to a conflict of ends. After commenting on the arguments advanced by other scholars, the presence of a certain idea of rationality in Berlin’s notion of value pluralism is advanced. Finally, it is demonstrated that incompatibility and incommensurability provide Berlin’s pluralism with its characteristic tragic feature which differentiates it from monism.
Notes
1. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 87.
2. This article follows Berlin’s usage by considering “value” and “end” as synonyms.
3. Berlin, Power of Ideas, 22.
4. Jahanbegloo, Conversations, 142.
5. Lukes, “Isaiah Berlin in Conversation,” 106–8.
6. Some critics point out that particularly in our everyday world, within our complex and multicultural democratic societies, almost nobody actually defends one value at a maximum level. See, e.g., Raz, Morality of Freedom, 322; García, El pensamiento político, 199. It could also be argued that human beings do not pursue one single end and that ends themselves never appear so clearly defined as to allow us to state plain questions like “do I want more freedom or more happiness?” or “do I want more justice or more piety?” However, this article maintains a certain level of abstraction and employs terms such as “absolute equality” or “perfect liberty,” while also considering values as clearly defined entities.
7. Berlin, Liberty, 172–73; Berlin, Power of Ideas, 197–98.
8. Jahanbegloo, Conversations, 145.
9. This “combination” does not mean that both values can be obtained without loss. It means that maybe we do not need to renounce one of them altogether in order to pursue (an increment of) the other. Besides, the decision taken need not be final. This is precisely what Berlin means when he talks about an “uneasy equilibrium.” Berlin, Crooked Timber, 19.
10. Lilla, Dworkin, and Silvers, eds., Legacy, 53 and ff.
11. This example shows particular applications of conflicting values. Thus a willingness to respect hierarchies may be considered within the more general value or end called “order,” while the second desire could be counted as part of the value of “participation.”
12. Quoted in Hardy, “Taking Pluralism Seriously,” 282–83.
13. Berlin, Liberty, 49; Jahanbegloo, Conversations, 41.
14. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 13.
15. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 8–9, 55.
16. Williams, “Conflicts of Values,” 226–27.
17. Berlin, Liberty, 13 and ff.
18. Berlin, Three Critics, 206.
19. Crowder, Isaiah Berlin, 138, 4, 130, 138.
20. Berlin, Liberty, 172–73.
21. Crowder, Isaiah Berlin, 74.
22. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 224. Here it would also be necessary to introduce the chronological and topological differentiation in Berlin’s pluralistic vision, as it applies to the variety of existent standards. These standards could change through time and space, which means that, culturally speaking, each civilisation and each time period would possess its own measures, which, though incompatible, should be considered as valid as the standards used by another civilisation or those used by that very same civilisation in a different era.
23. Galipeau, Isaiah Berlin’s Liberalism, 59.
24. Ignatieff, “Understanding Fascism?” 139; López, “Liberalismo agonista,” 147; Riley, “Defending Cultural Pluralism.”
25. Ibid., 322, 329, 359.
26. Raz, Morality of Freedom, 321–66, 322, 329, 359, 322, 325.
27. Ibid., 328–39. Curiously enough, an almost identical example is discussed by Berlin, who for other reasons rejects it as a valid example of value pluralism. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 11; Raz, Morality of Freedom, 337, 352.
28. Following Raz, Lukes suggests that for example, friendship or paternity are values which, when colliding with another value, demand us not to consider the situation rationally. Lukes, “Making Sense,” 138–39. It still seems that here lies hidden an odd vision of the value and meaning of friendship. We cannot understand friendship―or any other value―as forcing us not to choose rationally when it collides with another value.
29. Raz, Morality of Freedom, 325 (my emphasis).
30. Gray, Berlin, 51.
31. All in all, since artistic examples seem to be somewhat removed from political philosophy, Gray’s suggestion will be hereafter translated to the ethical and political field, though the definition of incommensurable employed could also be applied to art. On the other hand, throughout his study. Gray does mention the ideas presented here on a number of occasions, such as the absence of universal validity, or the possibility of grading values, though he does not always link them to incompatibility and incommensurability, but to pluralism in general. Gray, Berlin, 53, 61–62, 143.
32. Lukes, “Making Sense,” 134 (my emphasis).
33. The story of Sophocles’ classical tragedy Antigone is paradigmatic of a choice between mutually exclusive options. Eteocles and Polynices, both brothers of Antigone, fight each other for the rule of the city of Thebes. After both of them die in the battle, the new ruler, Creon, allows the burial of Eteocles, while declaring by law that, because he unjustly attacked the city, Polynices’ body must remain unburied. Antigone is therefore forced to choose between being a good citizen and respecting the law, and her no less important family and religious obligations, which would lead her to bury her brother and allow his spirit eternal rest.
34. Moreover, to consider incommensurability as the absence of a common measure can lead to bizarre situations, such as the ones presented in some of Kekes’s examples, in his discussion of the incommensurability between patriotism and spelunking. Kekes, Morality of Pluralism, 22. To begin with, it is questionable whether spelunking can be considered a value; but, in any case, such examples may obtain a common measure when we set them in a concrete situation and context. If we do not allow this contextualisation, any two activities might be posed as examples of incommensurability, like “square roots and insults, smells and canasta, migrating birds and X ray,” another set of odd examples posed by Kekes. Kekes, Morality of Pluralism, 21. This perspective deals with incommensurability in a way that does not correspond to what we are here discussing. On the other hand, it may even be questioned whether the existence of a common measure is actually necessary. Let us think about trade: we may carry out deals, exchanges, choices between different products without finding a common denominator. Money makes trade easier, but it was actually never a requisite for trade to take place.
35. Gray, Berlin, 43 and ff.
36. Gray is not the only author who extracts this conclusion from Berlin’s pluralism. See also Kocis―who may even have influenced Gray―who states on several occasions that pluralism implies a morality with no logical structure, therefore hindering the establishment of any rational ranking of values. Kocis, Critical Appraisal, 14, 110. Similarly, Lukes, and Strauss think that in Berlin’s pluralism, reason can help us to select the most appropriate means towards some ends, but not which ends to prefer. Lukes, “Making Sense,” 135; Strauss, Classical Political Rationalism, 18.
37. Gray, Berlin, 143, 1, 49.
38. Gray, Gray’s Anatomy, 107.
39. Badillo, “Pluralismo, Libertad, Decencia,” 170; Martínez, “El Pluralismo de Isaiah Berlin,” 197.
40. Raz, Morality of Freedom, 333–34.
41. Berlin, Power of Ideas, 181.
42. Berlin, “Reply to Robert Kocis,” 390–91.
43. Jahanbegloo, Conversations, 43.
44. Berlin and Williams, “Pluralism and Liberalism,” 307.
45. Berlin and Polanowska-Sygulska, Unfinished Dialogue, 143.
46. Hardy, “Taking Pluralism Seriously,” 283–84 (my emphasis).
47. Raz, Morality of Freedom, 332.
48. Maybe Raz would approve of the idea of rationality presented here, for he himself states that “[r]ational action is action for (what the agent takes to be) an undefeated reason. It is not necessarily action for a reason which defeats all others.” Raz, Morality of Freedom, 339 (my emphasis). However, it seems that he still wants pluralism to provide definite, universally valid answers, from an absolute point of view: “when we express a judgment about the value of options we strive to identify what is true independently of our valuation” (ibid., 327).
49. This discussion follows Martínez, “El Pluralismo de Isaiah Berlin,” where he reflects on the possibilities of pluralism without incommensurability. As for monism, there are many essays in which Berlin develops its three main ideas: Berlin, Crooked Timber, 5 and ff., 24 and ff., 183 and ff., 209 and ff.; Berlin, Sense of Reality, 170 and ff. Those ideas are (1) value questions have, like questions about fact, only one correct answer; (2) there is only one way to discover the correct answer, but it is possible for (some) people to obtain it; and (3) all answers, that is, all values, are perfectly compatible with each other. See also Berlin and Polanowska-Sygulska, Unfinished Dialogue, 143, for Berlin’s statement that the first is the most important idea of monism, and is the one from which the other two are derived.
50. Crowder, “Pluralism and Liberalism,” 294.
51. Berlin, Crooked Timber, 67, 191–92.
52. Carr, “Contra la Corriente,” 131.
53. Many authors who do not take this consequence into account ask why a decision that, whatever the outcome, brings good, should be called tragic. The answer lies precisely not in what you gain, but in what you realise you cannot but lose. To choose in value pluralism means to renounce other equally valuable ends.
54. Berlin, Liberty, 217.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Andrés Tutor de Ureta
Andrés Tutor de Ureta, PhD, is lecturer for the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the Jakarta Diplomatic School. He was previously a research fellow in philosophy at the University of Castilla-La Mancha, and has also worked as a coordinator at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC). His research interests include intellectual history and political philosophy. His publications include, among others, “Isaiah Berlin on Positive Freedom,” International Philosophical Quarterly, 2018; and “Santayana on Pluralism, Relativism and Rationality,” in Ch. Padrón and K. P. Skowroński, eds., The Life of Reason in an Age of Terrorism (Brill, 2018).