Abstract

After Rawls’s Political Liberalism reasonableness has come to the center of the political scene. It seems to respond to demands of our complex liberal democracies better than theories of rationality. Reasonableness is a multifaceted notion with an ethical and an epistemic dimension. In Rawls’s discourse the epistemic dimension is strongly affected by the «burdens of judgment» which, in turn, justify reasonable disagreement. I argue that, in parallel to a substantial reading of ethical reasonableness derived from Von Wright, we can hold a more optimistic view of epistemic reasonableness that allow more «reasonable agreement», even on controversial issues. In presenting this thesis I rely on the legal criterion of BARD («beyond any reasonable doubt»), the theory of argumentation and the epistemic virtues. Using also two examples drawn from contemporary conflictual issues, I conclude with more optimism than Rawls toward «reasonable agreements»