Liberal neutrality masks power by presenting exclusion as reason’s product

Evidence

Completely missing from such an approach is ‘the political’ in its dimension of power, antagonism and relationships of forces. What ‘political liberalism’ is at pains to eliminate is the element of ‘undecidability’ which is present in human relations. … But it is only because they have been made invisible through a clever stratagem: the distinction between ‘simple’ and ‘reasonable pluralism’. In that way, exclusions can be denied by declaring that they are the product of the ‘free exercise of practical reason’ that establishes the limits of possible consensus. … Thanks to this legerdemain. rationality and morality provide the key to solving the ‘paradox of liberalism’: how to eliminate its adversaries while remaining neutral. — Chantal Mouffe, The Democratic Paradox, 135

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The ‘paradox of liberalism — how to eliminate its adversaries while remaining neutral’ is a compact formulation of the whole critique, dense enough to repay revisiting.
• recurring: this claim recurs 3 times within its source
• XREF: connects to: The neutral liberal subject is defined against the racialized communitarian other; Liberal tolerance itself constructs and reproduces the others it claims to accept — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 494; Liberal universal citizenship can leave excluded identity intact beneath its surface — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1620 (+11 more)

Broader Connections

• Liberal democracy’s neutral ideals mask racial and gendered domination #expands (0.90) — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 406
• The neutral liberal subject is defined against the racialized communitarian other #expands (0.85)
• Liberal tolerance itself constructs and reproduces the others it claims to accept #expands (0.82) — Carl W. Ernst, Islamophobia in America_ The Anatomy of…, 494
• Liberal democratic values are ambiguous and can legitimize domination #corroborates (0.82) — Cristian Tileagă, The Nature of Prejudice, 114
• Liberal universal citizenship can leave excluded identity intact beneath its surface #corroborates (0.80) — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race, 1620
• Liberal state neutrality presupposes cultural homogeneity among the governed #expands (0.78) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 358
• Formal liberal citizenship equality masks an assimilationist strategy #expands (0.75)
• Groups invoke state neutrality only when they cannot dominate it #qualifies (0.75)
• Scientific neutrality is itself metaphysical and masks domination #expands (0.72) — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 43
• Perfect neutrality in politically charged science is elusive and possibly undesirable #expands (0.72) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 93