We are pleased to announce the call for abstracts for the panel on Kantian Constructivism in Legal Philosophy in the 8th General Conference of the European Consortium for Political Research that will be held at the University of Glasgow (3 – 6 September 2014).

Panel Chairs: Reidar Maliks (University of Oslo) Ruhi Demiray (Keele University and Kocaeli University).

Section: Kant and Kantian Constructivism in Moral and Political Philosophy (organized by the ECPR Kantian Standing Group).

Section chairs: Sorin Baiasu (Keele University and University of Vienna) and Alice Pinheiro Walla (Trinity College Dublin).

Political and legal theory is divided by two competing approaches, namely, the family of positivist approaches based on moral scepticism or moral indifferentism, and the family of ethical approaches based on substantive normative values that their protagonists consider self-evident but others, controversial. Dissatisfaction with the guidance these approaches could provide in dealing with the political and legal problems of the societies of contemporary world is a major reason for the recently raising interest in Kantian Constructivism among political and legal theorists. For Kantian Constructivism promises to provide a normative account of our political and legal practices on the basis of ideas of Right and Public Reason without falling into the pitfalls that approaches appealing to substantive normative values are faced with. This panel is thus designed to discuss what insights Kantian Constructivism brings about with regard to various dimensions and instances of our political and legal practices, such as the legitimate scope of legal regulation, the nature of legal obligation, juridical review over legislation, the separation of powers, political rights, political participation, and voting.

Please submit abstracts of no more than 150 words to: m.r.demiray@keele.ac.uk no later than February 7, 2014.