Abstract

Focusing on the self as a normative construct, I consider how and why the self, not the group, is ontologically fundamental. Selves live in communities or societies of selves. The intrinsic normativity of the self and the actions the self performs constitute the grounds on which people fashion coherent narratives about themselves and seek to display themselves to others in ways that conform to their narratives. People bond with, care for, and invest in each other as distinctive selves that they can coordinate with in a vast range of different activities and practices together with the conflicts and tensions between these activities and practices that define their political nature. The persistence or otherwise of the activities and projects that selves participate in is dependent on other activities and practices that lend their support and cooperation (or otherwise) to them. Activities and projects are therefore interdependent in ways that are more or less democratic. Selves-in-activities actively maintain, contest, and change these activities and projects. Political activity is thus seen as the processes of maintaining, contesting, and changing both selves-in-activities and the relations between activities.