REPÚBLICA E IMPARCIALIDADE. CONSIDERAÇÕES SOBRE ROUSSEAU, O IDEAL REPUBLICANO E OS LIMITES EPISTÊMICOS E NORMATIVOS DA POLÍTICA

The article deals with the structural limitations to which are submitted the epistemic requirements necessary to ensure the impartiality and, thus, the legitimacy of political decisions and actions. Its starting point is the presentation of Rousseau's theory of the general will and the conditions under which it can be determined and put into effect. The text proceeds with the critical examination of the way in which Rousseau examines that question. This is done by analyzing the distinction of the divisions of the sovereign body due to the particular nature of the questions submitted to deliberation, or to innocent errors, arising from failures of purely cognitive character on the part of minorities, point that, however, does not imply taking Condorcet's theorem as expressing Rousseau’s views on this matter. In the subsequent sections, the article tries to show how the difficulties encountered by the Social Contract theory to safely establish the conditions under which political deliberations can be considered as an expression of the general will are generalizable, highlighting problems and limitations that affect also contemporary theories of political normativity, of which the theoretical works of Rawls and Habermas are the main examples. The position defended in the text is that the difficulties in question must be considered as inherent to the constitutive conditions of all political decision. The text concludes showing how, as a result of these same factors, politics is necessary and therefore constantly challenged by the queries about the truth and the just character of the deliberations and actions through which the exercise of power takes place.