On morality and political compromise

As this week’s Middle East peace talks come to a close, many people are talking about the level of compromise necessary for the talks to have any hope of success. In politics, as in life, sometimes compromises are necessary… but can they be immoral?

We speak with Avishai Margalit, the George G. Kennan Professor at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton University and author of “On Compromise and Rotten Compromises” about the morality of political middle grounds. Margalit says that some compromises, made in the short term, can be morally reprehensible. And while we discuss the matter with the noted philosopher, we ask: what is a compromise if not compromising to one party?