Abstract
Stephen Darwall’s moral theory explains moral obligation by appealing to a “second-person” standpoint where persons use second-person reasons to hold one another accountable for their moral behavior. However, Darwall claims obligations obtain if and only if hypothetical persons endorse them, despite tying the second-person standpoint to our real-world moral practices. Focus on hypothetical persons renders critical elements of his account obscure. I solve this problem by distinguishing two ideas quietly working in tandem, (i) the hypothetical endorsement of moral norms and (ii) the hypothetical recognition of these norms. Hypothetical endorsement is a plausible source of normativity; hypothetical recognition is not. A more plausible account of second-person normativity must combine hypothetical endorsement with actual recognition. I term these alternative conceptions justification and easy publication. To combine justification and easy publication in an account of moral obligation, second-person normativity should be applied first to rules. Following other moral philosophers, I introduce the concept of a “social-moral” rule into an account of moral obligation. Social-moral rules acquire normative force when they are justified for and easily published by the relevant moral community. I conclude that a rule-centric account of second-personality is superior to Darwall’s reason-centric account.
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Notes
Making and acknowledging claims is to practice interpersonal morality.
For the original essay, see Strawson (1974, pp. 1–28).
Emphasis mine.
I shorten ‘moral obligations period’ to moral obligations.
For Hart, only public officials accept rules of recognition.
Darwall acknowledges this point, but does not apply it to moral rules.
Importantly, Darwall intends his second-person standpoint to provide a foundation for Kantian contractualism, so he could be open to my approach. However, his aim of grounding contractualist theories like Scanlon’s suggest that he does not intend to ground second-personal obligations in social-moral rules. I thank an anonymous referee for this point.
Justifications for social-moral rules can be agent-neutral if acceptable to all.
Formal legal authorities typically pass traffic laws, so in that sense someone has to endorse them. However, law and convention frequently arise without anyone intentionally ratifying them.
W.D. Ross’s famous critique of T.H. Green’s ‘rights recognition’ thesis is perhaps the most famous criticism of attempts to tie actual recognition to obligation. See Ross (1930, p. 51).
I thank an anonymous referee for helping me to see that the reversibility requirement can threaten even the epistemically impervious slave-owner’s authority.
Driver John may involve bipolar obligations but my account of second-person reasons does not concern them.
These beliefs need not be occurrent.
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Acknowledgments
This piece has been a long time coming, and many people have helped along the way. I am especially grateful to Jerry Gaus, Stephen Darwall, Connie Rosati, Mark LeBar, Jada Twedt Strabbing, Kyle Swan, Matthew Smith, Alex Worsnip, a host of anonymous referees, and a number of participants in Darwall’s seminar on moral recognition held at Yale in the fall of 2011.
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Vallier, K. Second Person Rules: An Alternative Approach to Second-Personal Normativity. Res Publica 23, 23–42 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-015-9305-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-015-9305-y