This conference will focus on two related themes that any discussion of liberalism has to tackle head on: flawed consent, and the role of truth in politics.

The role of truth in politics is discussed in political epistemology: in lamenting the (purportedly) post-truth era we live in, or in studying the role of fake news. But it is also discussed in other contexts. Such as in questioning what role truth may have in establishing legitimacy, or in asking whether constraints on speech – always suspicious from a liberal point of view – can be justified based on considerations regarding the truth-value (or related properties) of the content being expressed. In these ways and others, a liberal political philosophy should think again the relations between power and truth in politics.

Any work in moral and political philosophy must plausibly assign some role to consent. This seems especially true of liberal political philosophy. Yet the status of consent is often rightly challenged: consent may be flawed, or perhaps less than fully valid, in any number of circumstances and for any number of reasons. Discussions of flawed consent involve such phenomena as exploitation, manipulation, nudging, coercion, false consciousness, and more. A fuller understanding of consent – both when fully successful and valid, and when flawed – is thus needed for any viable liberal political philosophy.

One other way in which consent may be flawed is if it is given under false beliefs, perhaps especially when such beliefs are caused by the deception of the consent-receiver. This is one central way in which the two topics of the conference are related.

For further details, please contact David Enoch david.enoch [at] mail.huji.ac.il or Andrew Lichter alichter [at] arizona.edu