All the Kingdoms of the World

"This splendid book has something for everyone. For religious conservatives who question the separation of church and state, Vallier offers compelling arguments against their integration, drawing from Catholic theology, Church history, and considerations of social stability. For liberals, Vallier offers a bracing view of a powerful current stream of anti-liberal thought that should shatter any complacency about taking liberal political assumptions for granted. For people of all religious and political orientations, Vallier offers a rigorous method for assessing political proposals that does not presuppose liberal principles, but can serve as a basis for all to engage each other in serious discussion. In our politically polarized age, that is a major achievement."" Elizabeth Anderson, Max Shaye Professor of Public Philosophy, University of Michigan Kevin Vallier thoughtfully makes the case against post-liberal political doctrines, focusing on Catholic integralism. But he also pursues reconciliation with conservatives through his striking proposal for non-liberal charter cities within the framework of a liberal state. This book is a daring and original effort to adapt liberal political theory to a post-liberal era."" Yoram Hazony, author of Conservatism: A Rediscovery Integralism holds that state coercion is to be used to forward a religion's vision of the supernatural good. It is deeply statist and deeply illiberal; and, yet, it arguably follows from the teachings of Roman Catholicism. In All the Kingdoms of the World, Kevin Vallier does the great service of taking this position seriously-of presenting it with care, so that its attractions are plain. He also does the great service of showing why it nevertheless profoundly fails in its own terms as an account of a just, stable political order and how its failure provides lessons for the prospects of other emerging anti-liberal statisms. The book is intellectually invigorating, theoretically rigorous, and politically timely. I am grateful that it was written, and that it was Vallier who wrote it!"" Mark C. Murphy, McDevitt Professor of Religious Philosophy, Georgetown University"