Theoria

I argue that the concept of practical necessity adds to our understanding of the notion of constraint by analysing the use of this concept in the writings of Thucydides, Machiavelli, Hegel and Marx. Objective and subjective aspects of practical necessity are identified, and the relation between them is explained. It is also shown that human beings can be wrong about what is a matter of genuine practical necessity at the same time as some people have an interest in fostering in others false beliefs regarding this matter. In short, appeals to necessity may perform an ideological function.

In an effort towards developing a normative theory of federalism, this paper offers a critical assessment of the work of Will Kymlicka and Ferran Requejo in order to show the progress and failures of liberal nationalist authors on issues raised by the normative dimensions of federalism in Western multinational contexts. More exactly, the paper argues that both authors fail to give a complete theory of federalism because the liberal conception of self-determination as non-interference can only create superficial unity and contingent trust, especially in multinational contexts, where non-interference is to regulate relations between particular identities and conceptions of citizenship. Drawing on this critical assessment of liberal nationalism, I argue that the neo-republican ideal of non-domination, as developed by Philip Pettit (1997, 2012), provides us not only with the adequate normative heuristics to assess national rights of self-determination, but also international relations and the institutional conditions needed to create binding trust within multinational federal constellations.

I argue that a commitment to liberal neutrality, and an opposition to coercion, means that we ought to support a redistributive state in which wealth, insofar as it is instrumental in allowing us to pursue our ends, is equalised. This is due to the fact that any conception of justice and desert works in favour of some, but against others, and that those who lose out by any particular conception are likely not to consent to it (meaning that its imposition is coercive). As having some understanding of justice and desert is inescapable in a society, coercion is unavoidable. However, those who are harmed by the imposition of a certain conception of justice and desert deserve compensation for their foregone position in the alternate conceptions in which they would be better off. This compensation is owed by those who have benefitted from the existing conception of justice and desert.

Starting with Foucault's articulation of factors in the formation of an order of discourse, and Ludwik Fleck's ideas on the structures of thought collectives and thought styles, this article mounts some reflections on the relationship between internal and external conditions of knowledge formation. In particular, it will look at the productive function of thought constraints – discipline – in the formation and transmission of knowledge, and bring this consideration to bear on some perils besetting the humanities not only 'from without', but also 'from within', notably the turn from academic teaching to externally oriented professional training, and an uncritical, general-programmatic proclamation of 'Multi-, Inter, and Trans-Disciplinarity' ('MIT') reorganising discourses, disciplines and orders of knowledge.

Susan Booysen. 2011. The African National Congress and the Regeneration of Political Power. Johannesburg: Wits University Press.

Anthony Butler. 2012. The Idea of the ANC. Athens: Ohio University Press.

Stephen Ellis. 2012. External Mission: The ANC in Exile. Johannesburg: Jonathan Ball.

Arianna Lissoni, Jon Soske, Natasha Erlank, Noor Nieftagodien and Omar Badsha (eds). 2012. One Hundred Years of the ANC: Debating Liberation Histories Today. Johannesburg: Wits University Press and South African History Online.

Jeffrey D. Hilmer Agonistics: Thinking the World Politically by Chantal Mouffe

Benoit Challand Postcolonial Theory and the Specter of Capitalism by Vivek Chibber

Clare McCausland Civil Disobedience: Protest, Justification, and the Law by Tony Milligan