About

Alex Motchoulski is an Assistant Professor in the Corcoran Department of Philosophy at the University of Virginia. He holds a B.A. in Philosophy from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Arizona. His areas of specialization include Social and Political Philosophy, Moral Philosophy, and Politics, Philosophy, and Economics (PPE). His academic interests encompass Normative Ethics, Feminist Philosophy, Environmental Ethics, Medical Ethics, Jurisprudence, and Social Choice Theory. The information provided indicates his role involves teaching and research within these domains, contributing to the department's focus on these philosophical areas.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Political Science
• Law
• Law and economics
• Economics
• Social Science
• Positive economics
• Computer Science
• Mathematics
• Psychology
• Library science
• Public administration
• Philosophy
• Epistemology

Selected publications

• What is authoritarianism? A justificatory account

  European Journal of Political Theory · 2025-01-15 · 2 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Authoritarian social movements and governments have brought about some of the greatest horrors in human history. Naturally, research in the social sciences has aimed at developing an understanding of authoritarianism. Certain kinds of authoritarian things, like personalities or governments, are better understood as a consequence, but a general concept of authoritarianism remains absent. I develop a general account of the concept of political authoritarianism which I call justificatory authoritarianism. According to this view, authoritarianism is a justification of the imposition of political power over others by appeal to a prospect for considerable collective benefit, and that justification serves to suspend or suppress constraints on the exercise of political power.

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• Equality, efficiency and hierarchy in the workplace

  Economics and Philosophy · 2024-09-23 · 1 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Relational egalitarians argue that workplace hierarchy is wrong or unjust. However, even if workplace hierarchy is morally deficient in one respect, the efficiency of hierarchical cooperation might vindicate hierarchy. This paper assesses the extent to which relational egalitarians must make concessions to workplace hierarchy for the sake of efficiency. I argue that considerations of hierarchy provide egalitarians with reasons that make workplace hierarchy tolerable despite being unjustified, and, moreover, that under a predominantly hierarchical status quo, the practical import of egalitarian reasons is unlikely to be undercut. This can be the case even if social hierarchy sometimes constitutes social cooperation.

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• Reciprocity and the Rule of Law

  Australasian Journal of Philosophy · 2024-09-11

  article1st authorCorresponding
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• Relational Egalitarianism and Democracy

  Journal of Moral Philosophy · 2021 · 11 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Sociology
  • Political Science
  • Law and economics

  Abstract Relational egalitarians argue that democratic institutions are justified by appeal to relational equality. According to the skeptical challenge, equality of political power is not required for relational equality, and the relational egalitarian case for democracy fails. I defend the relational egalitarian justification of democracy. I develop an analysis of social status and show that inequalities of power will not entail inequalities of status. I then show that inequalities of power will robustly cause inequalities of status and argue that this vindicates the relational egalitarian case for democracy, because such theories have a much more pragmatic standard of success for the justification of democracy than conceptual necessity. I consider the objection that if inequalities of power robustly cause inequalities of status, then relational egalitarians should also oppose democratic institutions, because officials such as legislators or judges will have more power than citizens. In reply, I argue that relational egalitarians are only opposed to inequalities of status that mark a failure of recognition respect, and that inequalities of status that follow from democratically licensed inequalities of power will not mark such a failure. I conclude that the skeptical challenge is unsuccessful, and that the relational egalitarian justification of democracy is sound.

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• Justice, Reciprocity, and the Boundaries of State Authority*

  Journal of Political Philosophy · 2021 · 4 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Sociology
  • Political Science
  • Sociology
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• Democratic Public Justification

  Canadian Journal of Philosophy · 2020 · 1 citations

  1st authorCorresponding
  • Political Science
  • Sociology
  • Political Science

  Abstract Democratic institutions are appealing means of making publicly justified social choices. By allowing participation by all citizens, democracy can accommodate diversity among citizens, and by considering the perspectives of all, via ballots or debate, democratic results can approximate what the balance of reasons favors. I consider whether, and under what conditions, democratic institutions might reliably make publicly justified social decisions. I argue that conventional accounts of democracy, constituted by voting or deliberation, are unlikely to be effective public justification mechanisms. I conclude that the limitations of conventional mechanisms can be ameliorated through the use of lotteries instead of elections.

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• Principles of Collective Choice and Constraints of Fairness

  The Journal of Philosophy · 2019-01-01 · 17 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  In “The Difference Principle Would Not Be Chosen behind the Veil of Ignorance,” Johan E. Gustafsson argues that the parties in the Original Position (OP) would not choose the Difference Principle to regulate their society’s basic structure. In reply to this internal critique, we provide two arguments. First, his choice models do not serve as a counterexample to the choice of the difference principle, as the models must assume that individual rationality scales to collective contexts in a way that begs the question in favor of utilitarianism. Second, the choice models he develops are incompatible with the constraints of fairness that apply in the OP, which by design subordinates claims of rationality to claims of impartiality. When the OP is modeled correctly the difference principle is indeed entailed by the conditions of the OP.

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• Adjudicating distributive disagreement

  Synthese · 2019-10-24 · 2 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
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• The epistemic limits of shared reasons

  European Journal of Philosophy · 2019-08-25 · 3 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract Accounts of public reason disagree as to the conditions a reason must meet in order to qualify as public. On one prominent account, a reason is public if, and only if, it is shareable between citizens. The shareability account, I argue, relies on an implausibly demanding assumption regarding the epistemic capabilities of citizens. When more plausible, limited, epistemic capabilities are taken into consideration, the shareability account becomes self‐defeating. Under more limited epistemic conditions, few, if any, reasons will be shareable between all reasonable citizens, making the shareability account so demanding that it precludes public reasoning altogether.

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Frequent coauthors

• Phil Smolenski

  1 shared

Education

• Ph.D., Philosophy

  University of Arizona

  2022

• B.A., Philosophy

  University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

  2017