The Role of Judgment in Explanations of Politics

Abstract

This paper explores the role of judgment in politics. It argues that political judgment concerns our attempt to understand the actual causal relations of the world in order to maximize our chances of acting well in politics. Yet many of our explanations of politics ignore or discount this critical faculty. The first part of the paper defines political judgment. The second explores what are the prequisites of good political judgment. The final section examines the implications of the argument for the variety of approaches that characterize contemporary political science.