ABSTRACT

One of the key features of value pluralism, distinguishing it from relativism, is the idea that there are at least some values that are authoritative universally – ‘the great goods’, as Berlin calls them. This idea has been deployed by some writers to ‘constrain’ the unruliness of value plurality and even to propose political outcomes. In Chapter 2, I consider arguments from Riley, Hampshire, and Nussbaum that appeal to the great goods as a way of dealing with the problem of value pluralism. I argue that these proposals have merit in two respects: first, in giving content to the goods that are said to be plural and conflicting; second, in establishing these goods as overriding less fundamental goods, hence narrowing down to some degree the range of reasonable choice when goods conflict. However, this still leaves the problem of how to choose when the conflict is among the great goods themselves. The appeal to the great goods resolves the problem of value pluralism when conflict is between universals and lesser or local goods, but when universals collide the problem is no more than restated.