The logic of idealization in political theory

Abstract

The role of ideals and idealizations is among the most vigorously debated methodological questions in political theory. Yet, the debate seems at an impasse. This paper argues that this reflects a fundamental ambiguity over idealization's intended inferential logic: the precise way in which idealizations might yield normative knowledge. I identify two tacit understandings of idealization—a dominant “telic” understanding and a less overt “heuristic” understanding—which, though importantly different, are rarely distinguished. I argue that delineating these understandings, and shifting from telic to heuristic idealization, recasts various unresolved methodological problems for political theorists, while productively connecting their discussions to work on idealization in political science and the practice and philosophy of science more broadly. I then provide a systematic account of how idealization might be used heuristically in normative reasoning and explicate the advantages of such an approach for promoting rigorous, relevant, and inclusive methodologies in political theory.