The Good Royce and the Bad Royce, Or, Is Saving Royce from Himself Worth It?

Tommy J. Curry’s Another white Man’s Burden is an excellent study of Josiah Royce’s philosophy, particularly his social philosophy, within its historical milieu. I think that Curry is right with respect to his criticism of Royce’s social philosophy. As I read Another white Man’s Burden, I found myself distinguishing between the “good Royce” and the “bad Royce,” along the lines of the simplistic yet fruitful good-bad dichotomy Richard Rorty used to characterize philosophers such as John Dewey (see Rorty 213–14). By the “good Royce,” I mean the Royce whose thought is neither necessarily antiblack and racist, nor advances the cause of Anglo-Saxon cultural superiority. By the “bad Royce,” I mean the Royce whose thought is antiblack and racist, and advances the cause of Anglo-Saxon cultural superiority. The rest of this paper examines the differences between the good Royce and the bad Royce and explains how Royce’s philosophy is not an apologetics for white racist empire, even though Royce himself is likely an apologist for it.