acknowledgment against the monist view. ‘‘[S]ince some values may conXict
intrinsically, the very notion that a pattern must in principle be discoverable in
which they are all rendered harmonious is founded on a false a priori view of
what the world is like’’ (Berlin 1969 , li). Universalism, he argued, reduces every
value to the lowest common denominator, and ‘‘drained both lives and ideals of
the speciWc content which alone gave them point’’ (Berlin 1990 , 245 ). The belief
that there is aWnal, single unity ‘‘rests on the conviction that all the positive
values in which men have believed must, in the end, be compatible, and perhaps
even entail one another... [but] not all good things are compatible, still less all
the ideals of mankind’’ (Berlin 1969 , 167 ). A singular, harmonious, unitary, and
uniWed state was neither possible nor desirable within a context of liberty.
Again, while not explicitly acknowledged by Berlin, his work followed the
work of earlier pluralists in two additional ways. First, he argued that recog-
nition of the validity of multiple points of view and the incommensurability
of values is not relativistic. ‘‘Relativism is not the only alternative to univer-
salism... nor does incommensurability entail relativism. There are many
worlds, some of which overlap’’ (Berlin 1990 , 85 ). Berlin deWned pluralism as
‘‘the conception that there are many diVerent ends that men may seek and
still be fully rational, fully men, capable of understanding each other and
sympathizing and deriving light from each other’’ (Berlin 1990 , 11 ). Second,
Berlin also recognized the importance of groups and social context in the
development of our values; the understanding we get from one’s own group
gives us ‘‘the sense of being someone in the world’’ (Berlin 1969 , 157 ).
Unfortunately, Berlin’s concern with these elements of plurality was a minor-
ity view in the postwar era dominated by the Americans’ institutional focus.
3ResurrectingthePluralist
Imagination: Difference and
Engagement
.........................................................................................................................................................................................
By the 1980 s, a number of authors began to both resurrect important aspects
of pluralism’sWrst generation and imagine new paths for pluralist theory. The
epistemological foundation of pluralism, born in James’ radical empiricism
the pluralist imagination 147