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Teresa M Bejan
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Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration Kindle Edition

by Teresa M. Bejan (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.4 out of 5 stars 28 ratings

A New Statesman Best Book of the Year
A Church Times Book of the Year

We are facing a crisis of civility, a war of words polluting our public sphere. In liberal democracies committed to tolerating active, often heated disagreement, the loss of this virtue appears critical.

Most modern appeals to civility follow arguments by Hobbes or Locke by proposing to suppress disagreement or exclude views we deem “uncivil” for the sake of social harmony. By comparison, mere civility—a grudging conformity to norms of respectful behavior—as defended by Rhode Island’s founder, Roger Williams, might seem minimal and unappealing. Yet Teresa Bejan argues that Williams’s outlook offers a promising path forward in confronting our own crisis, one that challenges our fundamental assumptions about what a tolerant—and civil—society should look like.

“Penetrating and sophisticated.”
—James Ryerson, New York Times Book Review

“Would that more of us might learn to look into the past with such gravity and humility. We might end up with a more (or mere) civil society, yet.”
—Los Angeles Review of Books

“A deeply admirable book: original, persuasive, witty, and eloquent.”
—Jacob T. Levy, Review of Politics

“A terrific book—learned, vigorous, and challenging.”
—Alison McQueen, Stanford University

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  1. Print length
    269 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Harvard University Press
  4. Accessibility
    Learn more
  5. Publication date
    January 2, 2017
  6. File size
    1.5 MB
  7. Page Flip
    Enabled
  8. Word Wise
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  9. Enhanced typesetting
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“Impressive.”―Scott Yenor, Claremont Review of Books

“Mere Civility is a terrific book―learned, vigorous, and challenging. Bejan makes Roger Williams the hero of this story and the thinker who provides a principled justification for America’s exceptional permissiveness toward ‘uncivil’ speech. Justifying the American status quo isn’t easy. Doing it with arguments that are often surprising is even harder.”―Alison McQueen, Stanford University

“A deeply admirable book: original, persuasive, witty, and eloquent. It is also admirably, bracingly, skeptical, in the best sense: the kind of liberal skepticism that we associate in political theory with Judith Shklar, Bernard Williams, and George Kateb.”―Jacob T. Levy, Review of Politics

“Penetrating and sophisticated.”―James Ryerson, New York Times Book Review

“Mere Civility is centered in the years after the Reformation, when the emergence of myriad Protestant sects splintered communities across Western Europe. That splintering was magnified, just as in our own time, by the explosion of a new means of communication―the printing press―which allowed people who had never before had a public voice to spread their ideas far and wide. Invectives and broadsides were the order of the day, as members of different religious denominations fought for each other’s souls, and incivility became a central concern of political thought. I doubt that for most readers of Mere Civility, this account of social disarray in the Reformation years is a huge surprise. But by keeping a tight focus on the concept of civility, Bejan manages to make that old story feel new―or at least to draw new lessons from it, lessons that are particularly interesting within the context of contemporary political theory… [Mere Civility] does not purport to solve the problems of incivility, but it unknots them, making the nature of the problems―both in general and in this time of numbing nostalgia―more evident. Would that more of us might learn to look into the past with such gravity and humility. We might end up with a more (or mere) civil society, yet.”―Susan McWilliams, Los Angeles Review of Books

“Bejan’s important book is beautifully written, cogently argued, and provocative. It foregrounds the matter of ‘civility’ with astute historical analysis of touchstone texts in political thought.”―Jeffrey Collins, Queens University

“This carefully argued and documented volume documents three early modern understandings of civility, offering that of Rhode Island’s founder, Roger Williams, as a fitting response to our perceived crisis of civility.”―J. H. Fritz, Choice

About the Author

Teresa M. Bejan is Associate Professor of Political Theory in the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Oriel College.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B01N6SII7S
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Harvard University Press
  • Accessibility ‏ : ‎ Learn more
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ January 2, 2017
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 1.5 MB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 269 pages
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0674972735
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 out of 5 stars 28 ratings

About the author

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Teresa M Bejan

Teresa M Bejan

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Teresa M. Bejan is Associate Professor of Political Theory and a Fellow of Oriel College at the University of Oxford. Before coming to Oxford, Dr Bejan served as an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto and as a Mellon Research Fellow in the Society of Fellows at Columbia University. She received her Ph.D. with distinction from Yale University in 2013 and was awarded the American Political Science Association's Leo Strauss Award for the best doctoral dissertation in political philosophy. Her work has appeared in the Journal of Politics, History of Political Thought, the Review of Politics, History of European Ideas, and the Oxford Review of Education, among other academic journals. In 2016, she was awarded the 7th annual Balzan-Skinner Fellowship in Modern Intellectual History at the University of Cambridge.

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Top reviews from the United States

  • An interested reader
    5.0 out of 5 stars A major (re)examination of a crucial topic
    Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2017
    Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
    This book is a tour de force--an extremely careful, serious, and sophisticated analysis of a topic of cardinal importance to contemporary America. In clear and sprightly prose, Bejan examines the views on civility of three major thinkers (Roger Williams, Hobbes, and Locke) in order to contemplate the best way to ensure civility in our own wars of words. Surprisingly--and intriguingly--, Bejan argues that Williams' more minimalistic approach to civility and toleration is the best model for our age of anonymous Internet trolls and our Tweeter-in-Chief. And this is the case, despite the fact that Williams has not made nearly the sort of impact on scholarly discussions of civility as have Hobbes and Locke--and despite the fact that Williams himself was a polemical zealot who was so extreme he made Cotton Mather uncomfortable. Bejan doesn't hide any of these facts, and yet she masterfully and convincingly argues that Williams' view of "mere civility" is the best way forward.

    It is really refreshing to read such a well argued monograph that proposes a more civil libertarian approach to tolerance. In an age of "safe spaces" and "micro-agressions," Prof. Bejan's work is needed all the more. And yet even those who won't agree with Bejan will gain much from this book: her analyses of Williams, Hobbes, and Locke are all beautifully contextualized, carefully drawn, and filled with interesting information. More generally, Bejan demonstrates that our current age of uncivil discourse is hardly an anomaly: the early modern period had its own precursors to speech codes and hate-speech legislation, and the printing press once played the role of today's Internet.

    In all, this is a fascinating book on a crucial topic. Anyone worried about the current state of our political rhetoric must read it.
    22 people found this helpful
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  • P. GIBSON
    5.0 out of 5 stars Timely Reassessment
    Reviewed in the United States on February 21, 2019
    Format: Hardcover
    Mere Civility considers "civilitarianism". This complex, well written book delves into the history involving three views of civil speech brought to us by the lesser known radical preacher Roger Williams who founded Providence (RI) Plantations in 1636. The other two are from Thomas Hobbes, and John Locke. Each argument essentially rises out of the turmoil of the reformation. Williams was for the most liberal forms of free speech whereas Hobbes was for the most legislation against it. Locke . . ? His ideas changed over time but had no foundation.
    For Williams, the free exchange of ideas was necessary for freedom, education and civil tolerance. For Hobbes it was the end of civility and people must be silenced for the good of all. Today we have free speech. Will we prove Williams or Hobbes correct? Today we have plenty of intolerance on the left as well as the right. Sometimes calls for civility effectively silence others.
    Whether you, like me, agree with Williams that a high degree of disagreement should not only be tolerated but encouraged and debated (that we have a civil obligation to make our best reasoned arguments with those who disagree), or you think we should keep quiet, a degree of personal responsibility is required to maintain any such freedom. But if speech is intended to bludgeon and inhibit the chance of others to speak freely, this conflict of rights becomes difficult to sanction.
    Civility need not be pleasant, particularly peaceful or harmonious but it will be open, and this openness is a foundation that might dispel a lack of trust. Or we can go on ignoring one half of our countrymen by denying their values.
    3 people found this helpful
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  • Michael Shally-Jensen
    4.0 out of 5 stars Fascinating but not unflawed
    Reviewed in the United States on April 1, 2024
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    The key point about Teresa Bejan’s Mere Civility is that our current concepts of civility and toleration are built on liberal shibboleths that grew out of religion-infused social orders and hence contain all those same moral precepts, which one can justifiably question today. Hobbes preached a kind of public silence on contentious issues in order not to upset the moral order, as invested in the sovereign. (Ugh.) Locke moved toward a separation of religion from civil society that is the touchstone of modern conceptions, yet his version of civility, too, is founded on a morality that carries a lot of historical baggage. Bejan wants to go beyond those common understandings to eke out a new concept of civility that is not inherently judgmental, more “libertarian,” as it were, and essentially free of (historical) content. Her notion of “mere civility,” borrowed from Roger Williams, should be read as “bare” civility or “pure” civility, shorn of its traditional meaning and weight. It amounts to a kind of tolerance to the utmost, without any moral fervor behind it. Listening without judging, giving the other the liberty of his/her views to the nth degree, so to speak. And making due with a society that is naturally contentious and not necessarily well ordered (under some prevailing precept).
    Her point is interesting and has obvious implications for “woke” ideology, and the like. And she seems to recognize, near the end of her book, that her messenger, Roger Williams, is perhaps fatally flawed. Not only was Williams’ notion of mere civility based on the prospect of his converting the damned to his evangelical worldview, but he ended up participating in a war against his Native consultants, the Narragansett, and even sold some of them into slavery.
    For me, in any case, it’s a bit of stretch to forego, or bypass, all of liberalism’s “progress”—Bejan’s bête noire—on human rights and sensitivity toward others, however culturally/historically constrained that approach may be, in favor of an unfiltered, or “raw,” notion of civility at any cost. I can see how there is philosophical work to do in this area, and Bejan has moved the goalposts from their well-anchored position in liberal thought. But it might be better to critically question and refine the contents of current conceptions than to throw them over wholesale to get to some abstract purity, or base point, as originally imagined by a 17th-century theologian and proponent of “liberty of conscience.”
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  • Political Theorist
    2.0 out of 5 stars Dubious
    Reviewed in the United States on August 21, 2023
    Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase
    Intellectually dishonest with regard to both Locke and Rawls. Will appeal to conservatives who think believers are more tolerant of diversity than are mainstream liberal thinkers. Needless to say, that’s a questionable thesis.
    One person found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars The best piece of academic writing I have read in a very long time
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 23, 2017
    Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase
    This is a truly outstanding piece of scholarship. If read widely, this book has the power to challenge, and vastly improve, the ways in which disagreement is approached in our political cultures.
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