The Nature of Political Theory

160 The Nature of Political Theory

communitarianism has distinctively liberal aspects—although it is a different species
of liberalism. In the case of the work of MacIntyre, Sandel, Taylor, or Walzer, the
liberalism criticized is, what Taylor has referred to, as a version of ‘procedural’ liber-
alism (Taylor in Gutman (ed.) 1994: 60). Others have called this classical or atomistic
liberalism. The point that communitarians want to make here is that this latter species
of liberalism places far too much emphasis on the individual as a isolated and ‘unen-
cumbered’ agent. This conception has the effect of divorcing the individual from the
community. Such a liberalism is therefore seen to offer a preposterous view of the
self, which both ignores and undermines local and cultural communities. For some,
this procedural liberalism is regarded as ethnocentric (in an unwitting manner) and
also makes erroneous claims about both neutrality and rights. Thus, the idea that
rights are transcendent or universal principles is often fostered by procedural liberals.
Communitarians lay stress on the contingent and conventional basis of rights. Some
communitarians have even suggested moving away from an emphasis on individual-
istic rights discourse altogether, partly because it can undermine both public reason
and communal consensus.
A third communitarian theme focuses on ‘pre-understandings’. Communitarians
take for granted the idea of shared conventional moral and political resources, which
are not always open to critical examination. Such resources rather form a backdrop to
discussion. Again, this is something emphasized by Oakeshott, in a more nuanced and
sophisticated format. In the communitarian reading, communities are constituted by
such ‘pre-understandings’—which form a body of internal conventional standards.
Thus, the particularity of historical communities is set against the empty claims of
deontic and consequentialist ahistorical universality. The community forms the basis
for practical reason, value, and political judgement. In this sense, communitarians
are sceptical about aspects of Enlightenment thought—and are thus also indirectly or
directly sympathetic to the romantic and expressivist movements of the late eighteenth
and early nineteenth century—concerning the ability for abstract universal reasoning
to stand apart from social and moral traditions. Reason is substantive and situated
within communities. The community forms the basis of identity, an identity in large
measure inherited from the communal traditions. This body of shared attitudes,
habits, and rituals are essential for any community. Such a belief system is not conjured
out of thin air. It is always a deeply rooted pre-understanding.
Afourththemeisanimplicitegalitarianismincontemporarycommunitarianism—
particularly in the weaker variants. Each community is to be recognized as having
a unique identity, which should be respected. There is a pattern of argument here,
focusing on the complex linkage between ‘recognition’ and ‘identity’, which Charles
Taylor has called the ‘politics of recognition’. The basic idea is that identity is some-
thing which needs to be recognized in order to maintain itself. Isolated individuality
does not exist, it rather develops through recognition. Denying recognition is thus a
form of oppression, since it denies basic identity. We might recognize this immedi-
ately in terms of the rights of the human individual. However, in eighteenth century
writers such as Herder, the notion of identity was also linked with theVolk(or more
loosely public culture). Being true to oneself meant being true to one’s originality,