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COLLOQUIA & CONFERENCES
DOES LIBERALISM NEED ENEMIES?
Falguni Sheth
Hampshire College
February 9, 2005
Wednesday, 4:00pm-6:00pm
BA (Close/Hipp) 008
The phenomenon of "outcasting" select populations has often been understood
as the consequence of the hypocrisy of liberal societies. Within a liberal
political framework, societies claim to extend rights equally to the
entirety of its population, but then in the name of some overwhelming --
often thought to be unjustified -- national security concern, deprive
certain populations of protections or rights. In this paper, I argue that a
society can understand itself quite consistently as aspiring to the liberal
project of equal treatment and protection of its members, while
simultaneously marginalizing or ostracizing certain populations within its
midst. Moreover, the aspiration to the liberal goals of universal treatment
and equal treatment requires the constant presence of "an exception"
population or an "enemy".
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