Kadish Workshop in Law, Philosophy, and Political Theory: Daniel Viehoff, University of California, Berkeley

Authority and Control

Authority – the power to decide how another is to act – is a valuable and ubiquitous tool for organizing our common life. Authority is also widely thought to be problematic, and in need of special justification. An account of authority should illuminate both of these features. Yet many existing philosophical discussions of authority prioritize the latter over the former, with distorting effects on our understanding of authority and the social practices to which it is central. 

            The aim of this paper is threefold. First, it defends a deflationary account of what authority is. Second, it shows what it takes for authority (so understood) to be justified. Third, it shows how the deflationary account of what authority is, and how it can be justified, helps us better understand the role that authority plays in complex social contexts with high moral stakes. A particular focus is on scenarios in which officials are directed to treat others in ways that are ordinarily wrongful (as when a prison warden follows a judicial decision to punish a defendant who is, in fact, innocent). 

About Daniel Viehoff, University of California Berkeley

Daniel Viehoff is an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Berkeley. His research focuses on political and legal philosophy, ethics, and social philosophy. He is especially interested in questions of political authority and legitimacy, democracy and equality, and private law theory.

About the Workshop:

A workshop for presenting and discussing work in progress in moral, political, and legal theory. The central aim is to provide an opportunity for students to engage with philosophers, political theorists, and legal scholars working on normative questions. Another aim is to bring together people from different disciplines who have strong normative interests or who speak to issues of potential interest to philosophers and political theorists.  

The theme for the Fall 2024 workshop is “Disagreement.”

This semester the workshop is co-taught by Josh Cohen and Véronique Munoz-Dardé.