Solidarity and The Ethical Turn

Abstract:While politics and ethics are typically held to be distinct modes of judgment, that distinction often breaks down rather quickly in both theory and practice. This article focuses on one symptom of this breakdown: an academic trend that has been called "the ethical turn" in political theory. In response to social scientific approaches to politics that are seen as both too narrow and too structural, political theorists have increasingly drawn on ethical concepts that offer a promise of agency and relevance for their field. In doing so, however, contributions to the turn end up neglecting some valuable resources for theorizing politics. This article argues that solidarity, as a concept with stakes in both ethical judgment and political power, can be a useful tool for a political ethics.