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The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office

John William Devine Orcid Logo

Journal of Applied Philosophy, Volume: 41, Issue: 3, Pages: 391 - 408

Swansea University Author: John William Devine Orcid Logo

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DOI (Published version): 10.1111/japp.12683

Abstract

Should political leaders have a right to privacy? Incursions by the traditional media and new media into the private lives of political leaders are commonplace. Are such incursions ethically justifiable? Prima facie, the question of ‘political privacy’ seems to involve a conflict between a politicia...

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Published in: Journal of Applied Philosophy
ISSN: 0264-3758 1468-5930
Published: Wiley 2024
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa63373
first_indexed 2023-05-09T12:32:34Z
last_indexed 2024-11-15T18:01:28Z
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spelling 2024-09-02T16:09:31.8670426 v2 63373 2023-05-09 The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office f0448bdf1ad9d83e029d9b49ed910e33 0000-0002-0037-6556 John William Devine John William Devine true false 2023-05-09 EAAS Should political leaders have a right to privacy? Incursions by the traditional media and new media into the private lives of political leaders are commonplace. Are such incursions ethically justifiable? Prima facie, the question of ‘political privacy’ seems to involve a conflict between a politician’s selfinterestin retaining a protected private realm and citizens’ public interest in knowing about their representative’s private life. Indeed, this is the structure that the debate has typically assumed. I challenge this orthodox view by demonstrating that there is a public interest in political privacy grounded in the relationship between privacy and political judgement. I argue that the political privacy debate should be recast as principally a conflict between two different aspects of the public interest. This conflict presents a dilemma for democratic theory: in providing voters with private information relevant to the evaluation of political leaders’ suitability for, and performance in, office, we threaten toundermine the conditions necessary to attract candidates of judgement to office and for political leaders to judge well once in office. Journal Article Journal of Applied Philosophy 41 3 391 408 Wiley 0264-3758 1468-5930 1 7 2024 2024-07-01 10.1111/japp.12683 http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/japp.12683 In Press COLLEGE NANME Engineering and Applied Sciences School COLLEGE CODE EAAS Swansea University SU Library paid the OA fee (TA Institutional Deal) Swansea University 2024-09-02T16:09:31.8670426 2023-05-09T13:29:19.8992452 Faculty of Science and Engineering School of Engineering and Applied Sciences - Sport and Exercise Sciences John William Devine 0000-0002-0037-6556 1 63373__28366__e5f53cb3f7184257bb36a5cea569e00a.pdf 63373VoR.pdf 2023-08-24T08:30:14.0018721 Output 590890 application/pdf Version of Record true This is an open access article under the terms of theCreative Commons AttributionLicense, which permits use, distribution andreproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. true eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
title The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
spellingShingle The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
John William Devine
title_short The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
title_full The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
title_fullStr The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
title_full_unstemmed The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
title_sort The Political Privacy Dilemma: Private Lives and Public Office
author_id_str_mv f0448bdf1ad9d83e029d9b49ed910e33
author_id_fullname_str_mv f0448bdf1ad9d83e029d9b49ed910e33_***_John William Devine
author John William Devine
author2 John William Devine
format Journal article
container_title Journal of Applied Philosophy
container_volume 41
container_issue 3
container_start_page 391
publishDate 2024
institution Swansea University
issn 0264-3758
1468-5930
doi_str_mv 10.1111/japp.12683
publisher Wiley
college_str Faculty of Science and Engineering
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
department_str School of Engineering and Applied Sciences - Sport and Exercise Sciences{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Science and Engineering{{{_:::_}}}School of Engineering and Applied Sciences - Sport and Exercise Sciences
url http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/japp.12683
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description Should political leaders have a right to privacy? Incursions by the traditional media and new media into the private lives of political leaders are commonplace. Are such incursions ethically justifiable? Prima facie, the question of ‘political privacy’ seems to involve a conflict between a politician’s selfinterestin retaining a protected private realm and citizens’ public interest in knowing about their representative’s private life. Indeed, this is the structure that the debate has typically assumed. I challenge this orthodox view by demonstrating that there is a public interest in political privacy grounded in the relationship between privacy and political judgement. I argue that the political privacy debate should be recast as principally a conflict between two different aspects of the public interest. This conflict presents a dilemma for democratic theory: in providing voters with private information relevant to the evaluation of political leaders’ suitability for, and performance in, office, we threaten toundermine the conditions necessary to attract candidates of judgement to office and for political leaders to judge well once in office.
published_date 2024-07-01T08:21:37Z
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score 11.055822

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