Element contents
Series: Elements in Political Philosophy
The Conduct of Politics
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 February 2026
Summary
Do politicians have to get dirty hands – and what does that mean? Is it okay to be corrupt, when corruption is systemic? When is it a good thing to make compromises in politics? These are questions about political conduct that are raised in political ethics, a somewhat underappreciated subfield of political philosophy. This Element offers a fresh, systematic introduction to political ethics. It starts with a discussion of two challenges to the discipline: One comes from political realists who reject moralism in political philosophy and the other from public choice theorists who model politicians as rational egoists. It then discusses the problem of dirty hands, political corruption, and political compromise as three core topics of political ethics.
Information
- Type
- Element
- Information
- Series: Elements in Political PhilosophyOnline ISBN: 9781009558976Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication: 19 March 2026
Bibliography
Acton, Lord 1887/1948: Letter to Mandell Creighton, 5 April 1887. In Essays on Freedom and Power (ed. Himmelfarb, G.). Glencoe: The Free Press (pp. 358–367).Google Scholar
Aidt, Toke S. 2016: Rent Seeking and the Economics of Corruption. Constitutional Political Economy 27: 142–157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Applbaum, Arthur Isak 1999: Ethics for Adversaries: The Morality of Roles in Public and Professional Life. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Archard, David 2013: Dirty Hands and the Complicity of the Democratic Public. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 16: 777–790.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aristotle ca. 330BC/2009: Nicomachean Ethics (ed. Brown, L., transl. W. Ross). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Aytaç, Uğur and Rossi, Enzo 2023: Ideology Critique without Morality: A Radical Realist Approach. American Political Science Review 117: 1215–1227.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baume, Sandrine and Novak, Stephanie 2020: Compromise and Publicity in Democracy: An Ambiguous Relationship. In Baume, S. and Novak, S. (eds.): Compromises in Democracy. London: Palgrave Macmillan (pp. 69–94).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bellamy, Richard 1999: Liberalism and Pluralism: Towards a Politics of Compromise. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Bellamy, Richard 2010: Dirty Hands and Clean Gloves: Liberal Ideals and Real Politics. European Journal of Political Theory 9: 412–430.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bellamy, Richard 2012: Democracy, Compromise and the Representation Paradox: Coalition-government and Political Integrity. Government and Opposition 47: 441–465.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benjamin, Martin 1990: Splitting the Difference: Compromise and Integrity in Ethics and Politics. Lawrence: Kansas University Press.Google Scholar
Besley, Timothy 2006: Principled Agents? The Political Economy of Good Government. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Blau, Adrian 2018: Cognitive Corruption and Deliberative Democracy. Social Philosophy and Policy 35: 198–220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bonotti, Matteo 2017: Partisanship and Political Liberalism in Diverse Societies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowles, Samuel 2016: The Moral Economy: Why Good Incentives Are No Substitute for Good Citizens. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Brennan, Geoffrey and Buchanan, James M. 1981: The Normative Purpose of Economic “Science”: Rediscovery of an Eighteenth Century Method. International Review of Law and Economics 1: 155–166.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, Geoffrey and Buchanan, James M. 1985: The Reason of Rules: Constitutional Political Economy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Brennan, Geoffrey and Buchanan, James M. 1988: Is Public Choice Immoral? The Case for the “Nobel” Lie. Virginia Law Review 74: 179–189.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, Geoffrey and Hamlin, Alan 1995: Economizing on Virtue. Constitutional Political Economy 6: 35–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brennan, Jason 2016: Murderers at the Ballot Box: When Politicians May Lie to Bad Voters. In Crookston, E., Killoren, D. and Trerise, J. (eds.): Ethics in Politics: The Rights and Obligations of Individual Political Agents. New York: Routledge (pp. 11–34).Google Scholar
Brighouse, Harry and Fleurbaey, Marc 2010: Democracy and proportionality. Journal of Political Philosophy 18: 137–155.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchanan, James M. and Tullock, Gordon 1962: The Calculus of Consent: Logical Foundations of Constitutional Democracy. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.Google Scholar
Burelli, Carlo 2022: Political Normativity and the Functional Autonomy of Politics. European Journal of Political Theory 21: 627–649.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burke, Edmund 1775/1908: On Conciliation with the Colonies. In Speeches and Letters on American Affairs (ed. Rhys, E.). London: J. M. Dent & Sons (pp. 76–141).Google Scholar
Carens, Joseph H. 1979: Compromise in Politics. In Pennock, J. and Chapman, J. (eds.): Compromise in Ethics, Law, and Politics. New York: New York University Press (pp. 123–141).Google Scholar
Carey, Brian 2018: Public Reason – Honesty, not Sincerity. Journal of Political Philosophy 26: 47–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ceva, Emanuela and Ferretti, Maria Paola 2021: Political Corruption. New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chambers, Simone 2004: Behind Closed Doors: Publicity, Secrecy, and the Quality of Deliberation. Journal of Political Philosophy 12: 389–410.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charness, Gary and Pingle, Mark (eds.) 2022: The Art of Experimental Economics: Twenty Top Papers Reviewed. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Christiano, Thomas 1996: The Rule of the Many: Fundamental Issues in Democratic Theory. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Coady, C. A. J. 2004: Terrorism, Morality and Supreme Emergency. Ethics 114: 772–789.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coady, C. A. J. 2008: Messy Morality: The Challenge of Politics. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coll, Alberto R. 1991: Normative Prudence as a Tradition of Statecraft. Ethics and International Affairs 5: 33–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cross, Ben 2022: How Radical is Radical Realism? European Journal of Philosophy 30: 1110–1124.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
David-Barrett, Elizabeth and Philp, Mark 2022: Political Corruption. In Hall, E. and Sabl, A. (eds.): Political Ethics: A Reader. Princeton: Princeton University Press (pp. 170–192).Google Scholar
de Wijze, Stephen 2018: The Problem of Democratic Dirty Hands: Citizen Complicity, Responsibility, and Guilt. The Monist 101: 129–149.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dobel, J. Patrick 1998: Political Prudence and the Ethics of Leadership. Public Administration Review 58: 74–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Downs, Anthony 1957: An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy. Journal of Political Economy 65: 135–150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Erman, Eva and Möller, Niklas 2015: Political Legitimacy in the Real Normative World: The Priority of Morality and the Autonomy of the Political. British Journal of Political Science 45: 215–233.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Erman, Eva and Möller, Niklas 2023: The Problem of Political Normativity Understood as Functional Normativity. Journal of Philosophical Research 48: 149–168.Google Scholar
Estlund, David 2011: Human Nature and the Limits (If Any) of Political Philosophy. Philosophy & Public Affairs 39: 207–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frey, Bruno S. 1997: A Constitution for Knaves Crowds out Civic Virtue. The Economic Journal 107: 1043–1053.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fumurescu, Alin 2013: Compromise: A Political and Philosophical History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galston, William 1991: Toughness as a Political Virtue. Social Theory and Practice 17: 175–197.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galston, William 2010: Realism in Political Theory. European Journal of Political Theory 9: 385–411.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gaus, Gerald 2011: The Order of Public Reason: A Theory of Freedom and Morality in a Diverse and Bounded World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Geuss, Raymond 2008: Philosophy and Real Politics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Geuss, Raymond 2010: Politics and the Imagination. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ginsburg, Tom 2002: Ways of Criticizing Public Choice: The Uses of Empiricism and Theory in Legal Scholarship. University of Illinois Law Review 1139: 1139–1166.Google Scholar
Goodin, Robert E. 2008: Innovating Democracy: Democratic Theory and Practice after the Deliberative Turn. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gutmann, Amy and Thompson, Dennis 2012: The Spirit of Compromise: Why Governing Demands It and Campaigning Undermines It. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Hall, Edward 2017: How to Do Realistic Political Theory (and Why You Might Want to). European Journal of Political Theory 16: 283–303.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, Edward 2022a: Political Integrity. In Hall, E. and Sabl, A. (eds.): Political Ethics: A Reader. Princeton: Princeton University Press (pp. 65–81).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hall, Edward 2022b: Political Compromise and Dirty Hands. The Review of Politics 84: 214–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hamilton, Alexander, Madison, James and Jay, John 1788/1982: The Federalist Papers (ed. Cooke, J.). Middletown: Wesleyan University Press.Google Scholar
Hampshire, Stuart 1983: Public and Private Morality. In Hampshire, S. (ed.): Public and Private Morality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (pp. 23–54).Google Scholar
Hardimon, Michael O. 1994: Role Obligations. The Journal of Philosophy 91: 333–363.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hare, Richard M. 1981: Moral Thinking: Its Levels, Method, and Point. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Herzog, Lisa 2015: Distributive Justice, Feasibility Gridlocks, and the Harmfulness of Economic Ideology. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 18: 957–969.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hobbes, Thomas 1651/1998: Leviathan (ed. Gaskin, J. C. A.). New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Hollis, Martin 1982: Dirty Hands. British Journal of Political Science 12: 385–398.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Honig, Bonnie 1993: Political Theory and the Displacement of Politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Horton, John 2010: Realism, Liberal Moralism and a Political Theory of Modus Vivendi. European Journal of Political Theory 9: 431–448.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hume, David 1741/1985: Of the Independency of Parliament. In Essays. Moral, Political and Literary (ed. Miller, E. F.). Indianapolis: Liberty Fund (pp. 42–46).Google Scholar
Johnston, Michael 2005: Syndromes of Corruption. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jones, Peter and O’Flynn, Ian 2013: Can a Compromise be Fair? Politics, Philosophy & Economics 12: 115–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Juarez‐Garcia, Mario I. 2023: Should We Resurrect Institutional Corruption? Public Affairs Quarterly 37: 1–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Juarez‐Garcia, Mario I. 2025: What Philosophy Can Teach Political Economy about Corruption. A Non-Ideal Theory. Southern Economic Journal 91: 969–987.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jubb, Robert 2019: On What a Distinctively Political Normativity Is. Political Studies Review 17: 360–369.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kappel, Klemens 2018: How Moral Disagreement May Ground Principled Moral Compromise. Politics, Philosophy & Economics 17: 75–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelman, Mark 1988: On Democracy-Bashing: A Skeptical Look at the Theoretical and “Empirical” Practice of the Public Choice Movement. Virginia Law Review 74: 199–273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kelsen, Hans 1920/2013: The Essence and Value of Democracy (eds. Urbinati, N. and Invernizzi Accetti, C., transl. B. Graf). Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield.Google Scholar
Kirchgässner, Gebhard 2014: The Role of Homo Oeconomicus in the Political Economy of James Buchanan. Constitutional Political Economy 25: 2–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kliemt, Hartmut 2008: The Perspective of Philosophy. In Rowley, C. and Schneider, F. (eds.): Readings in Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy. New York: Springer (pp. 211–226).Google Scholar
Klitgaard, Robert 1988: Controlling Corruption. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Kogelmann, Brian 2015: Modeling the Individual for Constitutional Choice. Constitutional Political Economy 26: 455–474.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kogelmann, Brian 2023: In Defense of Knavish Constitutions. Public Choice 196: 141–156.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kramer, Matthew 2018: Problems of Dirty Hands as a Species of Moral Conflicts. The Monist 101: 187–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kuflik, Arthur 1979: Morality and Compromise. In Pennock, J. and Chapman, J. (eds.): Compromise in Ethics, Law, and Politics. New York: New York University Press (pp. 38–65).Google Scholar
Lambsdorff, Johann Graf 2007: The Institutional Economics of Corruption and Reform: Theory, Evidence and Policy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leader Maynard, Jonathan 2022: Political Realism as Methods not Metaethics. Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 25: 449–463.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leader Maynard, Jonathan and Worsnip, Alex 2018: Is There a Distinctively Political Normativity? Ethics 128: 756–787.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leff, Nathaniel H. 1964: Economic Development Through Bureaucratic Corruption. American Behavioral Scientist 8: 8–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lepora, Chiara and Goodin, Robert E. 2013: On Complicity and Compromise. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lessig, Lawrence 2011: Republic Lost: How Money Corrupts – and a Plan to Stop it. New York: Twelve.Google Scholar
Machiavelli, Niccolò 1532/1985: The Prince (transl. W. K. Marriott). Chicago: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Mansbridge, Jane 2009: A “Selection Model” of Political Representation. Journal of Political Philosophy 17: 369–398.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Margalit, Avishai 2010: On Compromise and Rotten Compromises. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Marx, Karl and Engels, Friedrich 1848/1969: Manifesto of the Communist Party (transl. S. Moore). In Selected Works Vol. 1. Moscow: Progress Publishers (pp. 98–137).Google Scholar
May, Simon Cǎbulea 2005: Principled Compromise and the Abortion Controversy. Philosophy & Public Affairs 33: 317–348.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
May, Simon Cǎbulea 2017: No Compromise on Racial Equality. In Rostbøll, C. and Scavenius, T. (eds.): Compromise and Disagreement in Contemporary Political Theory. London: Routledge (pp. 34–49).Google Scholar
May, Simon Cǎbulea 2024: Epistemic Peerhood and Moral Compromise. In Baghramian, M., Carter, J. and Cosker-Rowland, R. (eds.): Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Disagreement. New York: Routledge (pp. 411–422).Google Scholar
Miller, David 2016: In What Sense Must Political Philosophy Be Political? Social Philosophy and Policy 33: 155–174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Miller, Seumas 2017: Institutional Corruption: A Study in Applied Philosophy. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Montesquieu 1748/1989: The Spirit of the Laws (transl. and eds. Cohler, A., Miller, B., and Stone, H.). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Mueller, Dennis C. 2003: Public Choice III. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Muirhead, Russell and Rosenblum, Nancy L. 2022: Partisanship. In Hall, E. and Sabl, A. (eds.): Political Ethics: A Reader. Princeton: Princeton University Press (pp. 126–146).Google Scholar
Munger, Michael 2018: On the Contingent Vice of Corruption. Social Philosophy and Policy 35: 158–181.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mungiu-Pippidi, Alina 2013: Controlling Corruption through Collective Action. Journal of Democracy 24: 101–115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nagel, Thomas 1978: Ruthlessness in Public Life. In Hampshire, S. (ed.): Public and Private Morality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (pp. 75–91).Google Scholar
Nefsky, Julia 2019: Collective Harm and the Inefficacy Problem. Philosophy Compass 14: 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newey, Glen 2001: After Politics: The Rejection of Politics in Contemporary Liberal Philosophy. Basingstoke: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nielsen, Kai 2000: There is No Dilemma of Dirty Hands. In Rynard, P. and Shugarman, D. (eds.): Cruelty and Deception: The Controversy over Dirty Hands in Politics. Peterborough: Broadview Press (pp. 139–155).Google Scholar
Nye, Joseph 1967: Corruption and Political Development: A Cost-Benefit Analysis. American Political Science Review 61: 417–427.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Overeem, Patrick 2020: Compromise and Majority Rule: How Their Dynamic Affects Democracy. In Baume, S. and Novak, S. (eds.): Compromises in Democracy. London: Palgrave Macmillan (pp. 47–67).Google Scholar
Parrish, John M. 2007: Paradoxes of Political Ethics: From Dirty Hands to the Invisible Hand. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Persson, Anna, Rothstein, Bo and Teorell, Jan 2013: Why Anticorruption Reforms Fail: Systemic Corruption as a Collective Action Problem. Governance 26: 449–471.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Posner, Richard A. 1997: Rational Choice, Behavioral Economics, and the Law. Stanford Law Review 50: 1551–1575.Google Scholar
Prinz, Janosch and Rossi, Enzo 2017: Political Realism as Ideology Critique. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 20: 348–365.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Railton, Peter 1984: Alienation, Consequentialism, and the Demands of Morality. Philosophy & Public Affairs 13: 134–171.Google Scholar
Rawls, John 1996: Political Liberalism, paperback ed. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Rose-Ackerman, Susan 2016: Corruption. In Rowley, Charles K. and Schneider, Friedrich G. (eds.): Readings in Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy. New York: Springer (pp. 551–566).Google Scholar
Rose-Ackerman, Susan and Palifka, Bonnie J. 2016: Corruption and Government: Causes, Consequences and Reform, second ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rosenblum, Nancy L. 2008: On the Side of the Angels: An Appreciation of Parties and Partisanship. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Rossi, Enzo and Sleat, Matt 2014: Realism in Normative Political Theory. Philosophy Compass 9: 689–701.Google Scholar
Rostbøll, Christian 2017: Democratic Respect and Compromise. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 20: 619–635.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rothstein, Bo 2011: Anti-Corruption: The Indirect “Big Bang” Approach. Review of International Political Economy 18: 228–250.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rouméas, Élise 2021: The Procedural Value of Compromise. Social Theory and Practice 47: 377–396.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruser, Alexander and Machin, Amanda 2017: Against Political Compromise. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sabl, Andrew 2002: Ruling Passions: Political Offices and Democratic Ethics. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Sangiovanni, Andrea 2008: Justice and the Priority of Politics to Morality. Journal of Political Philosophy 16: 137–164.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schmidtz, David 2016: A Realistic Ideal. Social Philosophy and Policy 33: 1–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schmidtz, David 2023: Living Together: Inventing Moral Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schmitt, Sam 2023: The Problem of Low Expectations and the Principled Politician. Economics & Philosophy 39: 177–198.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schwartzberg, Melissa and Knight, Jack 2024: Democratic Deals: A Defense of Political Bargaining. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Schwartzman, Micah 2011: The Sincerity of Public Reason. Journal of Political Philosophy 19: 375–298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shapiro, Ian and Green, Donald 1994: Pathologies of Rational Choice Theory: A Critique of Applications in Political Science. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Shugarman, David P. 2000: Democratic Dirty Hands? In Rynard, P. and Shugarman, D. (eds.): Cruelty and Deception: The Controversy over Dirty Hands in Politics. Peterborough: Broadview Press (pp. 229–249).Google Scholar
Simmons, A. John 1979: Moral Principles and Political Obligations. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Sleat, Matt 2016: What Is a Political Value? Political Philosophy and Fidelity to Reality. Social Philosophy and Policy 33: 252–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sleat, Matt 2024: Against Realist Ideology Critique. Social Philosophy and Policy 41: 139–157.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Smith, Vernon 2007: Rationality in Economics: Constructivist and Ecological Forms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Spang, Friderike 2021: Why a Fair Compromise Requires Deliberation. Journal of Deliberative Democracy 17: 38–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thaler, Richard H. 2015: Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics. New York: W. W. Norton and Company.Google Scholar
Thompson, Dennis 1987: Political Ethics and Public Office. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Thompson, Dennis 1995: Ethics in Congress: From Individual to Institutional Corruption. Washington: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Thompson, Dennis 2018: Theories of Institutional Corruption. Annual Review of Political Science 21: 1–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tillyris, Demetris 2017: Political Integrity and Dirty Hands: Compromise and the Ambiguities of Betrayal. Res Publica 23: 475–494.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tullock, Gordon 1996: Corruption Theory and Practice. Contemporary Economic Policy 14: 6–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tully, James 2000: Struggles over Recognition and Redistribution. Constellations 7: 469–482.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Udehn, Lars 1996: The Limits of Public Choice: A Sociological Critique of the Economic Theory of Politics. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Vermeule, Adrian 2014: The Constitution of Risk. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Waldron, Jeremy 2018: Dirtying One’s Hands by Sharing a Polity with Others. The Monist 101: 216–234.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wall, Steven 2013: Political Morality and Constitutional Settlements. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 16: 481–499.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wall, Steven 2019: Rooted Reciprocity. Journal of Moral Philosophy 16: 463–485.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Walzer, Michael 1973: The Problem of Dirty Hands. Philosophy & Public Affairs 2: 160–180.Google Scholar
Walzer, Michael 1988/2004: Emergency Ethics. In Arguing about War. New Haven: Yale University Press (pp. 33–50).Google Scholar
Warren, Mark E. 2004: What Does Corruption Mean in a Democracy? American Journal of Political Science 48: 328–343.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weber, Max 1919/1977: Politics as a Vocation. In Essays in Sociology (transl. and eds. Gerth, H. and Mills, C.). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul (pp. 77–128).Google Scholar
Weinstock, Daniel M. 2013: On the Possibility of Principled Moral Compromise. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 16: 537–556.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinstock, Daniel M. 2017: The Ethics of Compromise. In Rostbøll, C. and Scavenius, T. (eds.): Compromise and Disagreement in Contemporary Political Theory. London: Routledge (pp. 65–78).Google Scholar
Weinstock, Daniel M. 2018: Corruption in Adversarial Systems: The Case of Democracy. Social Philosophy and Policy 35: 221–241.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2016: Compromise, Peace and Public Justification: Political Morality beyond Justice. London: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2017: Compromise and the Value of Widely Accepted Laws. In Rostbøll, C. and Scavenius, T. (eds.): Compromise and Disagreement in Contemporary Political Theory, London: Routledge (pp. 50–62).Google Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2019: In Defense of Unfair Compromises. Philosophical Studies 176: 2855–2875.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2023: May Political Parties Refuse to Govern? On Integrity, Compromise and Responsibility. Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 26: 1028–1047.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2025a: How (not) to Compromise: Classical Liberalism and the Challenge of Democratic Party Politics. In Horn, K., Kolev, S. and Müller, J. (eds.): Liberal Responses to Populism. Berlin: De Gruyter (pp. 103–116).Google Scholar
Wendt, Fabian 2025b: Bracketing Who Is Right: A Lesson from the Ethics of Compromise, Toleration, and War. Ethical Perspectives 32: 57–70.Google Scholar
Westphal, Manon 2017: Compromise as a Normative Ideal for Pluralistic Politics. In Rostbøll, C. and Scavenius, T. (eds.): Compromise and Disagreement in Contemporary Political Theory. London: Routledge (pp. 79–94).Google Scholar
White, Jonathan and Ypi, Lea 2016: The Meaning of Partisanship. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Williams, Bernard 1976: Persons, Character, and Morality. In Rorty, A. O. (ed.): The Identities of Persons. Berkeley: University of California Press (pp. 197–216).Google Scholar
Williams, Bernard 1978: Politics and Moral Character. In Hampshire, S. (ed.), Public and Private Morality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (pp. 55–73).Google Scholar
Williams, Bernard 2005: In the Beginning Was the Deed. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Wolak, Jennifer 2020: Compromise in an Age of Party Polarization. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zanetti, Véronique 2020: Proportionality and Compromises. Journal of Moral Philosophy 17: 75–97.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zuolo, Federico and Bistagnino, Guilia 2018: Disagreement, Peerhood, and Compromise. Social Theory and Practice 44: 593–618.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Accessibility standard: WCAG 2.0 A
Why this information is here
This section outlines the accessibility features of this content - including support for screen readers, full keyboard navigation and high-contrast display options. This may not be relevant for you.Accessibility Information
The HTML of this element
conforms to version 2.0 of the
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
(WCAG), ensuring core accessibility principles are addressed and meets the basic
(A)
level of WCAG compliance, addressing essential accessibility barriers.
Content Navigation
Table of contents navigation
Allows you to navigate directly to chapters, sections, or non‐text items through a linked table of contents, reducing the need for extensive scrolling.
Allows you to navigate directly to chapters, sections, or non‐text items through a linked table of contents, reducing the need for extensive scrolling.
Reading Order & Textual Equivalents
Single logical reading order
You will encounter all content (including footnotes, captions, etc.) in a clear, sequential flow, making it easier to follow with assistive tools like screen readers.
You will encounter all content (including footnotes, captions, etc.) in a clear, sequential flow, making it easier to follow with assistive tools like screen readers.
Structural and Technical Features
ARIA roles provided
You gain clarity from ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) roles and attributes, as they help assistive technologies interpret how each part of the content functions.
You gain clarity from ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) roles and attributes, as they help assistive technologies interpret how each part of the content functions.