Philosophers in Public Policy Commissions

What role should philosophers play in public policy, especially in structured contexts like policy commissions? The commission paradigm is a formal governmental setting for discussion aimed at policy recommendations. However, it may not be obvious what philosophers (predominantly normative theorists but also others like philosophers of science) can add to such commissions. What role a philosopher should play is worthy of investigation, especially because this can allow for more explicit methodologies and procedures to be provided to other commission members. This paper considers three such roles: “the partisan” (an advocate of a specific normative position), “the populist” (an exponent of public values), and “the philosophical conduit” (an explainer of disciplinary normative positions and arguments who draws attention to divergence and convergence on policy options across normative positions).