[SydPhil] University of Sydney Philosophy Seminar Series: Kathryn MacKay

[Ryan Cox]

Hi everyone,

This week’s speaker in the University of Sydney Philosophy Seminar Series is Kathryn MacKay (University of Sydney).

The title of Kathryn’s talk is “Institutions and Virtues”. Here’s the abstract for Kathryn’s talk:

This paper proposes a theory of virtue for socio-political institutions. Utilizing Oliver Williamson’s (2000) taxonomy of institutions and their structures, I will argue that socio-political institutions have an under-appreciated and under-theorised role in creating and maintaining the conditions for virtue at the community level. Social institutions have a widely-recognized role in creating, enforcing, or maintaining the laws, policies, regulations, expectations, customs, and contracts that govern behaviour and shape the pathways people can take through life. This role means that they ought to ensure that these structures tend toward political virtue, and away from political vice. So, a theory of political virtue (that is, virtues of the polis, not of politicians) should be incorporated into how we think about the ethics of institutions. Adapting Philippa Foot and adding a dash of Julia Annas, I propose that political virtues are detectable characteristics of institutions, which are beneficial to the whole of society, corrective to vicious states of affairs, and excellences of collective agency, where excellence is understood as expressive of a collective commitment to goodness.

The talk will take place on Wednesday the 15th of March at 3:30 p.m. in the Philosophy Seminar Room (N494) in the Quadrangle and will be simulcast via Zoom: https://uni-sydney.zoom.us/j/88699564848.

The talk will be followed by drinks and informal discussion at the Rose. All welcome!

Enquiries about the seminar series can be directed to ryan.cox at sydney.edu.au<mailto:ryan.cox at sydney.edu.au>

Ryan Cox
Associate Lecturer in Philosophy
Discipline of Philosophy
School of Humanities
University of Sydney
ryan.cox at sydney.edu.au<mailto:ryan.cox at sydney.edu.au>



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