Tolerance and Diversity in an Open Society

Although the idea of open society has had a foothold in public debates ever since the publication of Popper’s Open Society and Its Enemies, there is renewed interest in it in academic debates after the publication of Gerald Gaus’s Tyranny of the Ideal and, most recently The Open Society and Its Complexities, both of which draw explicitly on both Popper’s and Hayek’s work. Neither Popper nor Gaus, however, give a systematic rendering of what it takes for a society to be open and how the open society compares to its contemporary rivals. Given this lacuna, there is a valuable debate about the commitment to an open society that engages a variety of political viewpoints that cuts across other debates in political philosophy.

The goal of this conference is to encourage some of the best political thinkers of our time to critically analyze the idea of the open society. We are interested in clarifying what features characterize the open society, why openness is valuable, and how the open society compares to alternative political orders. In particular, the conference will focus on the challenges of diversity and toleration that come in an open society. 

The participants will include:

Sahar Fard, Ohio State
Toby Handfield, Monash
Keith Hankins, Chapman
Royal Hansen, Google
Chandran Kukathas, Singapore Tech
Helene Landemore, Yale
Ryan Muldoon, Buffalo
Virginia Postrel, Chapman
Christof Royer, CEU
Robert Talisse, Vandebilt
John Thrasher, Chapman
Piers Turner, Ohio State
Chad van Schoelandt, Tulane