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• Neo-Hobbesian democracy: The theory of modus vivendi and democratic legitimacy

  25-41

  Milán Pap

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  In political theory, the criticism of Rawlsian constructivist liberalism has been articulated in
  theories of political realism. John Gray, one of the promoters of realist liberalism, recommends
  a neo-Hobbesian way of social coexistence which is based on the conflictual and antagonistic
  idea of political life. It takes social values and forms of life as incommensurable in modern
  multicultural societies. Taking value-pluralism and its conflicts seriously, a theory of modus
  vivendi has been articulated among realist political thinkers. Being a post-liberal (or post-Enlightenment) theory, modus vivendi is more a practice oriented and open-ended theory than
  philosophical constructions based on high morality. Modus vivendi theorists make an emphasis
  on the peaceful co-existence of social groups and a moral minimum of the political society. One of
  the deficiency of the theory is that it says not much about democracy, though it would be highly
  useful according to two contextual considerations.On the one hand, a modern political system
  would be impossible or outrageous without any form of democratic legitimacy. On the other
  hand, there is an exhaustion of the liberal project(s) and the societies featured by multicultural
  prosperity. Besides constitutional protection, defending democracy in this new context means
  balancing between cultural and other value-oriented groups in modern societies. In my paper,
  I make an attempt to examine the concept of democracy in the light of modus vivendi theory.