Understanding Political Feasibility*

Lawford‐Smith, Holly

doi:10.1111/j.1467-9760.2012.00422.x

Cited by 101 publications

(71 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Additionally, despite political theory sometimes conflating feasibility with desirability – the latter being a normative or evaluative construct about moral goodness of states of affairs (Gilabert and Lawford‐Smith, ) – here the theoretical focus is exclusively on feasibility. It is specifically intended as a conceptual tool for ranking states of affairs along a crucial dimension relevant for their political practicability (Lawford‐Smith, ).…”

Section: Feasibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Indeed, questions of feasibility and desirability cannot be neatly separated even at the theoretical level, since mutual feedbacks and feedforwards inextricably intertwine them. Nonetheless, for analytical purposes, it is possible to distinguish (Lawford‐Smith, ) considerations about feasibility – those carried out here – that relate to what is morally possible, from considerations about desirability that relate to what is morally appealing (Rawls, ). In this regard, some lines of thought (e.g.…”

Section: Feasibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Sulfur in the Sky with Diamonds: An Inquiry into the Feasibility of Solar Geoengineering

Grasso

2019

Global Policy

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Solar geoengineering (SG) is considered a promising, albeit controversial, climate engineering technology to help reduce predicted global warming. However, the complexity of SG raises serious doubts about its political practicability. The objective of this article is to investigate this technology's feasibility, a fundamental dimension of said practicability. Feasibility is here understood as a political property: the higher the feasibility of a state of affairs ranks, the greater its eventual political practicability. According to this perspective, the less SG clashes with economic, institutional, and moral soft constraints, the more feasible it becomes, and hence the greater its political practicability. An analysis of economic and institutional soft constraints points to a high degree of SG feasibility. This feasibility is, however, limited by the perceived non‐bearable moral costs which SG involves. Given the greater weight of moral soft constraints, SG's overall feasibility is therefore low. Based on these indications, the article offers suggestions for lessening SG's friction with soft constraints, especially with the highly sensitive moral ones, with the aim of increasing this technology's feasibility. On the basis of this heightened feasibility, the paper concludes with policy recommendations which improves the practicability of SG.

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Section: Feasibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Feasibilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Sulfur in the Sky with Diamonds: An Inquiry into the Feasibility of Solar Geoengineering

Grasso

2019

Global Policy

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“…48 We agree that this provides a more nuanced approach to evaluate the options available to the political representatives under the UNFCCC. In contrast to the binary understanding, a scalar conceptualisation of feasibility is better suited to accommodate options that depend on the behaviour of others:…”

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confidence: 99%

“…50 This does not make the adoption of a strong climate policy infeasible in the binary sense, but it clearly makes it less feasible in the scalar sense. 51 The delegated authority model and climate change 9 Can these considerations regarding feasibility save the legitimacy of the UNFCCC? The answer is no.…”

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confidence: 99%

The delegated authority model misused as a strategy of disengagement in the case of climate change

Smet

Peeters

Sterckx

2016

Ethics & Global Politics

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“…1 Related conditional analyses of feasibility have recently made a resurgence in political philosophy (see Brennan and Southwood 2007;Gilabert and Lawford-Smith 2012;Lawford-Smith 2013;Gilabert forthcoming;cf. Southwood 2016).…”

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confidence: 99%