Responsibility and Normative Moral Theories

Philosophical Quarterly 68 (272):603-625 (2018)
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Abstract

Stephen Darwall and R. Jay Wallace have independently argued that morality is essentially interpersonal by appealing to necessary connections between morality and responsibility. According to Darwall, morality is grounded in fundamentally second-personal accountability relations. On Wallace's view, a normative moral theory must say that agents’ attitudes towards the moral properties of their actions are reasons for responsibility reactions, which only relational moral theories can do. If either argument succeeds, non-relational moral theories are flawed. I demonstrate that neither argument succeeds. First, I show that grounding morality in accountability relations is implausible. I then argue that the necessary connections that Wallace posits between responsibility and morality exist but need not be explained by moral theories. Finally, drawing on the objections to Darwall and Wallace, I show that, plausibly, no necessary connection between morality and responsibility exists that would rule out any non-relational moral theory. Hence, Darwall and Wallace's strategy does not work.

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Jada Twedt Strabbing
Wayne State University

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References found in this work

Freedom and Resentment.Peter Strawson - 1962 - Proceedings of the British Academy 48:187-211.
Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments.R. Jay Wallace - 1994 - Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Précis of Responsibility and the Moral Sentiments.R. Jay Wallace - 2002 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 64 (3):680-681.
The Moralistic Fallacy.Daniel Jacobson - 2000 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 61 (1):65-90.

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