Susan Sherwin, Peter Schotch Engaged Philosophy Essays in Honour of David Braybrooke 2007

Engaged Philosophy:
Essays in Honour of
David Braybrooke
Engaged Philosophy:
Essays in Honour of David
Braybrooke
Edited by
Susan Sherwin and Peter Schotch
UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS

Toronto Buffalo London
c University of Toronto Press Incorporated 2006

Toronto Buffalo London
Printed in Canada
ISBN 0-8020-3890-5
Printed on acid-free paper
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Engaged philosophy: essays in honour of David Braybrooke
edited by Susan Sherwin and Peter K. Schotch.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8020-3890-5
1. Philosophy and social sciences. 2. Ethics. 3. Braybrooke, David. I.
Braybrooke, David II. Schotch, Peter K. III. Sherwin, Susan, 1947
B63.E54 2006 170 C2005-90614-2
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its

publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario
Arts Council.
University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial support for its
publishing activities of the Government of Canada through the Book
Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP).
Contents
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
1 Introduction:
About David Braybrooke
Susan Sherwin
1.1 David Braybrooke, the Personal Story
1.2 David Braybrooke, the Scholar . . .
1.3 Overview of Essays . . . . . . . . .
1.4 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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xi
3
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11
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Part One: Practical Engagement
21
2 Teaching Class: Justice and Privatization in Education

Nathan Brett
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.2 Privatization and Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.2.1 Efficiency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.2.2 Benefits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.3 Two Normative Contrasts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.3.1 Exclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.3.2 Partiality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.3.3 The Public-Private Divide in the Real World
2.4 Education, Equality, and Choice . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.4.1 The Demands of Justice . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.4.2 Free-Market Choices . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.5 The Priority of Justice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.6 Education as a Human Need . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.7 Fair Opportunity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2.8 Teaching Class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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vi
CONTENTS
3 Determining Health Care Needs After the Human Genome

Project: Reflections on Genetic Tests for Breast Cancer
Susan Sherwin
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3.2 The World after the Human Genome Project . . . . . .
3.3 The Case for Treating BRCA Testing as a Need . . . .
3.4 Some Complicating Features of BRCA Testing . . . . .
3.5 Towards a Relational Understanding of Needs . . . . .
3.6 BRCA Testing Revisited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 The Mutual Limitation of Needs as Bases of Moral Entitlements: A Solution to Braybrookes Problem
Duncan MacIntosh
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.2 The Appeal of Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.3 Braybrookes Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.4 Possible Solutions to Braybrookes Problem . . . . . .
4.4.1 Questioning the Empirical Assumptions of the Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.4.2 The Defeasibility of Needs . . . . . . . . . . . .
4.4.3 Is the Location of Needs in Individuals or Groups?
4.4.4 Do People Really Need Indefinitely Long Lives?
4.4.5 Needs to Life Extension Not Really More Pressing Than So-Called Less Basic Needs . . . . . .
4.4.6 Meeting Basic Needs versus Meeting the Needs
the Meeting of Which Make Life Worth Living .
4.4.7 Meeting Other Peoples Needs as Not Really Being a Cost to the Meeting of Our Own Needs
Given That We Are Needs Altruists . . . . . . .
4.4.8 Needs as Relative to Projects Approved by Communities; Re-Choosing Needs . . . . . . . . . .
4.4.9 The Conceptual Analysis of Needs; the Axiomatics of Needs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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5 Canadians and Global Beneficence: Human Security Revisited

Edna Keeble
5.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.2 The Ethics of State Responsibility . . . . . . . . . . . .
5.3 Freedom from Fear and Freedom from Want . . . .
5.4 The Ethics of Individual Responsibility . . . . . . . . .
5.5 Rethinking Human Security . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6 Braybrooke on Public Policy: Precautionary and Fair; Feasible and Ameliorative
Sharon Sutherland
6.1 Introduction to Braybrookes Strategy . . . . . . . . . .
6.2 Approaches to Making Public Policy . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.1 The Rational-Deductive, Comprehensively Rational, Synoptic, or Economics Model . . . . . . .
6.2.2 Satisficing, or Environmental Heuristics: Simons
Alternative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.3 Some of Simons Successors . . . . . . . . . . .
6.2.4 Incrementalism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3 Braybrookes Citizen Management . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3.1 Braybrookes Disjointed Incrementalism . . . .
6.3.2 Virtues of Disjointed Incrementalism for the Individual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3.3 Virtues of Disjointed Incrementalism in a Social
Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.3.4 Braybrookes Cautions . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.4 Policy Applications Compared . . . . . . . . . . . . .
6.5 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7 Life of Pi and the Existence of Tigers
Steven Burns
7.1 Authors Note . . . . . . . . . .
7.2 Toronto and Pondicherry . . . . .
7.3 A Digression on Belief . . . . . .
7.4 The Tiger in the Lifeboat . . . .
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101
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CONTENTS
viii
7.5
7.6
7.7
7.8
Ockhams Razor . . . . . . . . . .
Ministry of Transport Investigators
Which Is the Better Story? . . . . .
Is the Tiger REAL? . . . . . . . .
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Part Two: Theoretical Engagement
191
8 David Braybrookes Philosophy of Social Science

Meredith Ralston
8.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8.2 Traditional Philosophy of Social Science . . .
8.3 Braybrookes Contribution . . . . . . . . . . .
8.4 Feminist Epistemologies . . . . . . . . . . . .
8.5 Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9 Empathy and Egoism
Sue Campbell
9.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9.2 Shermans Account of Empathy . . . . . .
9.3 Default Egoism in Sherman . . . . . . . .
9.4 Imagining Empathic Selves . . . . . . . .
9.5 Moral Sentiment . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9.6 Common Purpose and Relational Interests
9.7 Re-imagining the Self . . . . . . . . . . .
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10 The Problem of Moral Judgement

Richmond Campbell
10.1 The Problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10.2 Moral Realism: The Default Position . . . . .
10.3 Externalist Moral Realism . . . . . . . . . .
10.4 Internalist Moral Realism . . . . . . . . . . .
10.5 The Belief-Desire Theory of Moral Judgment .
10.6 Two Objections Briefly Considered . . . . . .
10.7 The Opposition between Reason and Emotion
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11 Moral Claims and Epistemic Contexts

Michael Hymers
11.1 Moores Open Question . . . . . . . . . .
11.2 Deflationism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11.3 Contextualism: Default and Challenge . .
11.4 Contextualism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
11.5 Ethical Contexts and Meta-ethical Contexts
11.6 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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12 Braybrooke and the Formal Structure of Moral Justification

Tom Vinci
12.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12.2 Braybrooke on the Open-Question Argument . . . . . .
12.3 Explorations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12.4 Three Conceptions of Meta-ethics . . . . . . . . . . . .
12.5 A Side Trip to Epistemology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
12.6 The Main Line of Advance Resumed . . . . . . . . . .
12.7 An Alternative Briefly Considered . . . . . . . . . . . .
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13 David Braybrooke On the Track of PPE

Peter K. Schotch
13.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13.2 How Track Came About . . . . . . .
13.3 The Basic Set-up . . . . . . . . . . .
13.4 How to Apply Moral Philosophy . .
13.5 Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13.5.1 When good actions go badly .
13.6 Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
13.7 Utilitarianism . . . . . . . . . . . .
13.8 Wheres the politics? . . . . . . . . .
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14 Bootstrapping Norms: From Cause to Intention

Bryson Brown
343
14.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
14.2 Rules in Logic on the Track of Social Change . . . . . . 348
CONTENTS
14.3 Some Worries . . . . . . . . . . . . .

14.4 The Bootstrap Argument . . . . . . . .
14.5 The Roots of Normativity . . . . . . .
14.5.1 Evolutionary Advantage . . . .
14.5.2 Naturalism . . . . . . . . . . .
14.5.3 Metalanguage. . . . . . . . . .
14.5.4 The bootstrap . . . . . . . . .
14.5.5 Interpretation of self and others
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Appendix A
AnotherLiterarySide of David Braybrooke: The Comic
Dialectician
Excerpt from Faculty Council Minutes, 29 September 1983 .
Excerpt from Faculty Minutes, 11 October 1983 . . . . . . .
An Open Letter from David Braybrooke . . . . . . . . . . .
365
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369
369
Appendix B
David Braybrookes Publications 1955-2005
Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Journal Articles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Chapters in Books . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Book Reviews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
373
373
374
378
383
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Notes on Contributors
387
References
391
Index
410
Acknowledgments
The editors and contributors to this volume are grateful for the generous support received from various individuals and offices of Dalhousie
University, especially the Vice President (Academic and Research), the
Dean of Arts and Social Sciences, and the Department of Philosophy.
ENGAGED PHILOSOPHY
Chapter 1
Introduction: About David

Braybrooke
S USAN S HERWIN
Abstract
This chapter introduces the reader to the life and work of David Braybrooke. It identifies key themes in his extensive list of publications and
explains the significance of the essays in this collection.
This collection of original essays has been produced by faculty members who have been colleagues or students of David Braybrooke in his
years of full-time teaching at Dalhousie University (1963-90).1 Our intention is to express our collective affection, admiration, and respect for
this important philosopher on the occasion of his eightieth birthday by
reflecting on aspects of his life and work as they have inspired our own
philosophical thinking.
By happy coincidence, the publication of this volume coincides with
the momentous publication of his own book, Analytical Political Philosophy: From Discourse, Edification, the fourth in a series of books
Braybrooke has published with University of Toronto Press since 1998.
Thanks
to Richmond Campbell and Steven Burns for editorial advice on this chapter.
1 He has been a very active Emeritus Professor since 1990, retaining a summer home in Halifax
and spending three to four months per year in Nova Scotia, enthusiastically engaged in philosophical activities. Hence, all who are themselves situated in Halifax still count themselves among his
current colleagues
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION
The othersMoral Objectives, Rules, and the Forms of Social Change

(1998), Natural Law Modernized (2001), and Utilitarianism: Restorations; Repairs; Renovations (2004)together form an integrated, mutually reinforcing corpus of many of the major ideas he has contributed
to the literature of political philosophy and the philosophy of social science throughout his career. So weighty is this four-volume collection,
and so absorbing of his philosophical energies over the past decade,
Braybrooke has come to think of it, unofficially, as the Summa Philosophica Latirivuli (where latus stands for braywhich is dialectical (Northamptonshire) English for broadand rivulus for brook).
This working title is vintage Braybrooke, combining his lifelong love
of classics, his offbeat, irreverent sense of humour, and an acknowledgment of the collective and far-reaching significance of his influence
on philosophical thought. The designation signifies the interconnected
complexity of Braybrookes philosophical works and makes visible the
over-arching program that ties the various pieces together. We fondly
share in adoption of this designation and add our own essays to complement the Summa by offering reflections on the themes he explores there
and in his earlier publications.
To help set the stage for the chapters that follow, I shall review some
of Braybrookes significant intellectual and scholarly writings in order
to provide the reader with a sense of how his many publications weave
together to form a general theoretical system; I hope also to provide
some insight into why this system is so valuable. I shall approach this
task by first reviewing his personal journey through political philosophy
and then by briefly discussing three key themes that structure his work.2
Finally, I shall briefly explain the organization of this book and highlight
the role of each chapter.
2 I am very grateful to David for his assistance and patient cooperation in piecing together
some of the elements of a rich and complex life in a couple of personal interviews in June 2004.
1.1. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE PERSONAL STORY
1.1 David Braybrooke, the Personal Story

David3 was born 18 October 1924 in the United States and came of
age during the Second World War. He started his university education
at Hobart College, where he majored in classics with the intention of
preparing for a career in the United States Foreign Service. His undergraduate study was interrupted, however, by the war. He volunteered
for service in the United States Army early in 1943 and found himself
stationed in Antwerp several months after D-Day. (He notes that Hitler
gave up shortly after he appeared in Europe and suggests that perhaps
Hitler calculated that if the United States was prepared to send the likes
of Braybrooke into war, it must have been very confident indeed.) For
the first month and a half in Antwerp, he experienced frequent bombardments of the city by German buzz bombs and rockets. A rocket
landed a mere block away from where he was waiting for a tram one
day, causing houses and their inhabitants to completely disappear before his eyes. That experience gave him a rich appreciation for life and
gratitude for each day he is alive, an attitude that has served him well in
all subsequent years; he truly does embrace each day with obvious joy
at the opportunities it affords.
In the end, his time in the army, like the rest of his life, was largely
dedicated to intellectual pursuits. While still in Antwerp, he managed
to find a tutor to help him study Latin and Greek poetry. The army also
sent him to Louisiana State University then to the University of Illinois
to study basic engineering, and, since he found himself on a university
campus, he managed at LSU to take courses in literary criticism and
sociology. He was even able to persuade the army to send him to Cambridge, England, for a term before he was discharged.
After a little more than three years in the army, he returned to complete his BA and prepare for academic work in the area of social and
3 Readers will notice a shift in style of reference to David Braybrooke in this Introduction. It
reflects my own struggle, and that of most of the other contributors to the volume, in deciding how
best to refer to a man who is both an influential scholar and a personal friend. We have resolved
this problem by using the formal Braybrooke whenever we are discussing his work, as merits
respectful discussion of any authors work; when speaking personally about the man, as I do in
parts of this Introduction, we shift to the more informal David to capture the warm regard in
which we hold him.
political theory. He was torn between studying psychology at Yale or

economics at Harvard; his decision to pursue economics at Harvard was
heavily influenced by Professor Brooks Otis, his mentor from Hobart
College and an early role model for his life as a scholar. Otis was a
great classical scholar who later became chair at Stanford and then university professor at Chapel Hill; among his other claims to fame is the
fact that he introduced David to the work of John Maynard Keynes.
David reckoned that it was necessary to have a firm grounding in economics to work effectively in social and political thought. (As well,
David did some personal utility calculations and determined that since
he would be unlikely to read much economics purely for pleasure, it
was important to approach it in a disciplined way.)
After graduation, and with the continuing support of Professor Otis,
David was invited back to Hobart to teach as an instructor in history
and literature within an excellent general education program dealing
with Western civilization. But he grew restless in this role and soon
embarked on graduate work at Cornell University in the department
of philosophy. At that time, Cornell required philosophy doctoral students to specialize in two subfields of philosophy and also to study one
field outside of philosophy. David chose ethics and epistemology as his
philosophy subfields and economics for his outside interest. (Those
choices have served him well throughout his career and are well represented within the essays of this collection.) His dissertation was on
welfare and happiness, and the economist on his committee directed
him to include a chapter dealing with Arrows work on social choice
theory (much to the chagrin of the philosophers on the committee who
thought it was the hardest thing they ever had to readserves them
right! in Davids opinion). This led to his first publication, Farewell
to the New Welfare Economics, a very heartfelt farewell at the time,
though he has found himself returning to this subject in later years and
now sees it as one of the foundations of his work.
He completed his PhD in 1953 and took up an instructorship at the
University of Michigan. While this opportunity was considered one
of the best jobs in the country for a new philosophy graduate, David
thought that the industrial design of the Ann Arbor campus had little
charm: buildings were depressing on the outside and graceless on the

inside. He also felt somewhat alienated from his colleagues there since
they seemed principally occupied with denigrating the merits of ordinary language philosophy while Davids approach was (and is) much
more pragmatic: use ordinary language philosophy where it is helpful
and employ other methods where it falls short. He soon left Michigan
for Bowdoin College, a small liberal arts college in New England which
he found to be more to his temperament; indeed, he remembers Bowdoin as being his version of heavenjust the sort of place he had always
wanted to teach.
Alas, he was not to stay in this idyllic setting for long. By chance,
returning by ship from Oxford in 1953, David had met a professor from
Yale who proposed him for a special position that would recognize his
distinctive talents, teaching philosophy in an interdisciplinary program
and working with Professor Charles E. Lindblom in the honours program in economics and politics for juniors and seniors. This was an
offer David found too good to refuse; an ambitious young professor
simply did not turn down offers from Yale then (or now). One of the
happy consequences of this position was a long-term, fruitful collaboration with Professor Lindblom. Not all of his colleagues at Yale were so
pleased with his versatility and tendency to cross traditional disciplinary
boundaries, however. It seems that he was judged to be too much of a
philosopher for the social scientists and too much of a social scientist
for the philosophers. Moreover, the timing of his stay at Yale was most
unfortunate: the entire philosophy department was severely divided between analytical and continental theorists at that time. As a result of
these struggles over method and philosophical orientation, David was
denied tenure at Yale.
Fortunately, he won a Guggenheim Fellowship at the very same time
as his tenure decision was being announced, and that honour and opportunity took some of the sting out of the tenure news. (It also helped ease
the pain to learn that all of the other analytical philosophers in the department decamped the following year to join the department of philosophy at the University of Pittsburgh; clearly, he was not the only one to
find the atmosphere inhospitable to analytically oriented philosophers.)
As a result of having published and perished at Yale, David decided he would retire early by moving to a site where he would be free
to teach and live as he liked with little of the pressure to publish that
characterized life in an Ivy League institution. His goal now was to enjoy other aspects of his rich, self-directed intellectual life. Fortunately
for the contributors to this volume and for thousands of others he has
taught and inspired, he selected Dalhousie University, in Halifax, Nova
Scotia, for that retirement from the fray of academic intensity. When
he arrived in 1963, he found Dalhousie to be a small, provincial university by the sea that concentrated on undergraduate education and the
training of doctors, lawyers, and other professionals. The philosophy
department had only recently been separated off from psychology, and
its few other members had little interest in publishing; they exercised
no research demands on him. Moreover, he was able to secure a position that was to be half-time in philosophy and half in the department
of political science; in other words, his interdisciplinary interests were
acknowledged and valued at his new academic home.
At that time, there were only about a half-dozen serious scholars in
the humanities and social sciences at Dalhousie, and it was easy to get to
know each of them well. It made for a stimulating, interdisciplinary, intellectual community in which David thrived. And while the Dalhousie
library was small compared with what he had become accustomed to at
Yale, at least it had the advantage of having the books it owned ready at
hand since there was so little competition for the books that interested
him. It is worth noting, though, that this calm backwater atmosphere did
not last very long. Co-incident with his time at the university, Dalhousie
has evolved into a serious research institution with strong departments
of philosophy and political science. David played no small part in this
transformation, and he is rightly proud of his contribution to a stimulating and supportive environment.
I can speak most authoritatively of his impact on the philosophy department at Dalhousie since it has been my own academic home for the
past thirty years. Here, David has shown both intellectual and personal
leadership. On the intellectual front, he has always shared his work with
colleagues and students and encouraged critical discussion with those
interested in philosophy at every stage of learning. Most of his books

have been at least tried out in the classroom if not also initiated there.
He believes universities should make more of the opportunity for undergraduates to share in a professors active research. They have things to
contribute partly because they are not already steeped in the literature.
He has also been remarkably generous in his willingness to engage with
the work of others; no matter how busy he is, he always offers prompt,
insightful, and supportive feedback.
Moreover, he has insisted on promoting an atmosphere of true collegiality and has conscientiously role-modelled the behaviours that support it. Probably influenced by his painful time at Yale, where he found
himself struggling to launch his own career within a deeply divided department, David has worked hard to foster healthy departmental relations at Dalhousie University. Within the philosophy department, this
takes the form of a few institutionalized rituals. Faculty members meet
for Wednesday lunches at the University Club, which allow us to share
ideas and concerns in an informal atmosphere outside of more structured department meetings. Even more important, however, is our weekly philosophy colloquium series, which meets all year round, stopping
only for Christmas and the Labour Day weekend. These sessions are
scheduled for Friday afternoons and are routinely followed by beer at
the Graduate Students Club, where students, faculty, and interested others can continue to debate the topic of the weekly paper.
Much to our local benefit, David became so content at Dalhousie
that he was able to resist several tempting efforts to recruit him to join
his analytical colleagues from Yale at their new home at the University
of Pittsburgh, despite the fact that their arrival there helped to make it
the strongest philosophy department in North America at the time. Although David sometimes wonders if his work would have received even
more attention if he had accepted one of those offers and situated himself in a leading American university, he generously credits Dalhousie
for providing a stimulating environment that allowed him to be productive and creative. Moreover, it was a place in which he was, for the
most part, happy, a condition he thinks played an important role in his
achievements.
10
Relieved of the pressure to produce that defined life in an Ivy League

university, he found himself free to pursue whatever research projects
captured his imagination. He soon settled into a very productive publishing pace that seems only to accelerate with age. On reviewing his
long and growing list of significant publications, one might easily get
the sense that David is a man totally occupied with work. That would
be a big mistake. He has always understood that while meaningful work
is very important to everyone, it is not the whole of life. It is also important to make room for travel, music, literature, art, romance, and,
generally, for fun. (He loves to laugh, and his laughter is infectious.
Finding tidbits of absurd news stories to amuse him has become something of a competitive sport among his colleagues and friends. Readers
can get a pretty good impression of his mischievous side by reading Appendix A.) Without such activities, he believes, one becomes less rather
than more productive, and definitely less creative.
As an academic, he takes seriously all dimensions of a professors responsibilities: research, teaching, and administrative work. His research
accomplishments are readily available to all and form the basis of most
articles in this book. His teaching and administrative accomplishments
are less visible to the larger world, but they have had a profound impact
on the thousands of students and colleagues who have directly benefited
from the opportunity to work with him (and on those who have the opportunity of studying/working with others he has inspired). He loves
teaching and it shows. (Some recent and cherished evaluations report
Braybrooke rocks! and Professor Braybrooke is fun to be with.) It is
with much ambivalence that he will finally cease offering formal classes
in 2005 as he turns eighty-one.
Indeed, it is this love of teaching that eventually took him to Texas.
Dalhousie University has long had a rule of mandatory retirement at
age 65. David was by no means ready to give up teaching in 1989
it will be difficult enough to do in 2005so he decided it was finally
time to accept one of the many offers he received over the years from
the United States and took up the position of Centennial Commission
Chair in the Liberal Arts (Professor of Government and Professor of
Philosophy) at the University of Texas at Austin. Fortunately for us,
1.2. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE SCHOLAR
11
he maintained a home in Nova Scotia and has arranged to spend a few

months each summer back at Dalhousie, where he remains an active
presence in our summer reading groups and weekly philosophy colloquium sessions. His philosophical engagement with his immediate and
distant colleagues shows no signs of slowing, despite the fact that he is
now approaching yet another retirement (this time from the University
of Texas at Austin).
1.2 David Braybrooke, the Scholar

Braybrookes work centres around the interrelated themes of needs,
rights, and rules with particular attention to the appropriate processes
for making changes in existing social rules. He argues that proper understanding of these three concepts helps to constitute a meaningful and
practical approach to social justice. Hence, he has been concerned
with making clear how to interpret and apply these familiar, but often
misused, concepts that figure so prominently in political debates about
public policies.
While deeply respectful of alternative philosophical schools, Braybrooke situates his own work within the analytic tradition that has dominated English-language philosophy for many decades; it relies on rigour
and conceptual analysis as principal tools. His aim is to help guide policy debates by allowing participants to determine appropriate rules for
attending to the needs of citizens of nations and of the world in a fair
and achievable way. His staunch support of analytic philosophy has
meant that throughout his career he has frequently found himself embroiled in what might be dubbed philosophy wars (akin to the recent
struggles over the nature of science and scientific activities commonly
referred to as the science wars). Indeed, his most recent work, the
forthcoming Analytical Political Philosophy, has been written with the
principal intention of responding to charges from pro-Straussian colleagues at the University of Texas at Austin who claim there is no value
in analytical approaches to political philosophy.4 Braybrookes work
4 It is ironic that David discovered Leo Strauss long before any of the people who now challenge Davids philosophical approach in the name of Strauss: After one year of undergraduate
12
clearly demonstrates the error of this thesis.

His efforts at clarifying and applying the core concepts of needs,
rights, and rules add up to a program for democratic action. It incorporates three basic assumptions: (1) meeting certain needs is the basic
purpose of public policy, (2) rules are required to make sure appropriate needs are met, and (3) these rules must include rules governing
rights. Braybrooke has long been willing to stare down the challenge
of postmodernism; indeed, he is even willing to accept the somewhat
unfashionable label of grand program to describe the intent of these
efforts to render political life more coherent, more just, and even more
noble.5 His own grand program is particularly valuable by virtue of the
fact that it has been developed in tandem with (and, hence, attentive to)
other important philosophers offering their own versions of the grand
program in political philosophy, principally, John Rawls, Robert Nozick, and David Gauthier. Like them, he sets out his understanding of the
basic structure available to a politically organized society. Braybrooke
differs from these others in an important way, however: he situates these
terms in the context of real-world concerns of daily politics in an industrialized Western democracy (and, hence, the title of this collection of
essays). Moreover, he is not one to forget his debts to the history of
philosophical ideas; he makes great efforts to relate his own program
within two important, and usually considered to be widely different,
historical traditions: utilitarianism and natural law theory.6
Let us look, then, more closely at his work on these three key concepts, beginning with needs.7 Braybrooke argues that surely the principal question for all social policies is to consider their impact on human
welfare. Such a project requires some way of measuring the relevant
impact of policies, and that requires us to identify appropriate criteria
for our focus. As countless critics have demonstrated, utility as it is genstudy, David headed off to the New School to take some graduate classes. There he had the opportunity to take a class from the soon-to-be-famous Leo Strauss on the work of Socrates, Machiavelli,
and Hobbes.
5 This phrase is taken from the Introduction to Analytical Political Philosophy, draft
manuscript.
6 These historical connections are made most clearly and fully in his recent books, Utilitarianism (2004) and Natural Law Modernized (2001).
7 The first comprehensive discussion of needs appears in his 1987 book, Meeting Needs.
1.2. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE SCHOLAR
13
erally understood is too problematic a measure for this task, though its
principal insight of considering the welfare of everyone is sound. Braybrooke argues that a conception of human needs can better serve the
role of evaluating the social worth of public policies. Such a concept
must distinguish between mere wants or preferences and the things that
are necessary to a life worth living. Thus, public policies should be
held accountable for first meeting the latter and, then, for allowing as
much room as possible for individuals to pursue their own preferences.
Needs may be either course-of-life (what is required for life or health)
or adventitious (what is required for meeting particular goals), and it
is important to understand the distinction to ensure that policies do not
lose track of course-of-life needs in responding to vocal demands for
meeting particular adventitious needs.
While some course-of-life needs are clearly universal by virtue of
biological requirements for nutrition, hydration, shelter, sleep, and so
on, others are not (e.g., medical care), and adventitious needs may be
very diverse indeed. Hence, public policy must be evaluated in terms of
the needs of a specific reference population; those responsible for determining these needs will belong to a policy-making population, which
may not be the same as the reference population.8 It is, ultimately, a
matter of general public debate what shall be deemed needs that must
be met for a given population, the minimum standard of provision of
those needs, as well as the policies that should be pursued to meet those
needs. Clearly, then, the rules for that debate become very important.
So, too, is a measure for comparing the effectiveness of different policies at meeting the needs of the population in question. Braybrooke
introduced the census notion (described below) to solve that problem.9
Braybrookes work on the concept of rights is intertwined with his
work on the concept of rules.10 He argues that rights attach to individu8 I follow Braybrookes terminology in his recent work here; it is far more accessible than the
alternative form Selfgovliset which he used in the original Meeting Needs book.
9 The census notion requires agreement on minimal standards for provision of a need (e.g.
what would constitute adequate nutrition for a 150-pound adult), and then everyone in the population is to be surveyed to see whether they are receiving enough calories and vitamins to meet this
minimum; priority is then placed on bringing everyone up to the minimum (for their particular
size).
10 The first substantive discussion of rights appears in his 1968 book, Three Tests for Democ-
14
als, and their administration is largely left to the individual in question.

Individuals are not alone in their responsibility for enacting their rights,
of course. There is a collective responsibility to ensure that the rights of
others are respected. This shared responsibility often requires more than
just formal acknowledgment of the rights of others; it may also require
us to ensure that the conditions are in place to permit them to exercise
their rights. Governments are to be judged according to the respect and
protection they provide of individual rights (both our own and those of
our fellow citizens). His theory of rights is based on what he has developed as a census notion of welfare. According to the census notion,
policies should aim to push as many people as possible into higher categories of welfare, leaving as few as possible behind. In this way, he is
able to set measurable tests for democracy that link both rights and welfare (as he has argued since his 1968 book, Three Tests for Democracy:
Personal Rights, Human Welfare, Collective Preference).
On his account, rights are, ultimately, social: they only make sense
within a defined social context. More specifically, they are best understood as a particular type of settled social rule. As such, rights apply and
are exercised within particular societies. Things are a bit more complicated yet, since rights actually involve two kinds of rules: those governing what it means to have and exercise a right and those determining
who actually has a particular right. Because rights represent a kind of
(double) rule, it is useful to understand their formal structure if we wish
to make evaluations about governments ability to respect rights. This
interest in getting clear on the nature of social rules has led him into the
formalism of deontic logic (in Logic on the Track of Social Change).
As Peter Schotch demonstrates in chapter 13, the formal work on rules
permeates multiple dimensions of Braybrookes grand program.
1.3
The Structure of the Volume: Overview of Essays
The rest of the essays in this book take up several of the major ideas
in Braybrookes work and are divided into two major blocks reflecting
racy. His work on rules appears in many places but is most thoroughly discussed in Logic on the
Track of Social Change.
1.3. OVERVIEW OF ESSAYS
15
the general theme of the book and of Braybrookes work. Part I, Practical Engagement, deals with ways in which Braybrookes ideas connect
up with the practical world of public policy or personal responsibilities. Part II, Theoretical Engagement, consists of essays that explore
the philosophical underpinnings of his work and look more closely at
some of the theoretical debates that occupied him.
More specifically, chapters 2 through 4 focus on his very important
work on needs. In chapter 2, Nathan Brett brings this framework to
bear on the subject of private education. He explores the threat to
justice of increased moves to privatization of education for families who
can afford it. Braybrooke views education as a basic need of human
beings and warns that justice requires us to ensure that this need is met
to a reasonable standard for all young people. With this concern for
equal educational outcomes, Brett examines some of the current debates
regarding private versus public education services and examines the
negative impact on equality of private schooling. He concludes that the
trend to increased use of private schooling is resulting in reductions of
social justice.
In chapter 3, I take up Braybrookes work on needs to explore a
pressing question about how we should address the potentially growing
set of medical demands for services that test for genetic dispositions
to contract life-threatening illnesses. I look specifically at the topic
of access to tests for genetic susceptibility to inherited forms of breast
and ovarian cancer. By reflecting on Braybrookes distinction between
course-of-life needs and adventitious needs, and drawing on feminist
work on relational understandings of personhood and needs, I am able
to help refocus the debate and find a basis for distinguishing genuine
health needs from health desires; while the latter may be strongly felt,
only course-of-life needs should be given priority in allocating limited
public health resources.
Duncan MacIntosh (chapter 4) takes up the arguments of chapter 3
and some in Braybrookes book, Meeting Needs (1987). He considers several possible solutions to the problem Braybrooke first identified
as the bottomless pit of medical needs for technological support of
those whose lives could be extended. MacIntosh argues, contra Bray-
16
brooke, that there is no clear and reliable distinction to be drawn between course-of-life needs and adventitious needs. He proposes a strategy that will constrain the bottomless pit of medical demands by only
permitting communities to recognize as needs with attached rights those
projects that are in fact co-feasible within that community.
Edna Keeble (chapter 5) pieces together some of Braybrookes ideas
about democratic theory and questions of state and personal responsibility in order to address some urgent questions in the philosophy of
international relations. She reviews his proposals regarding the personal responsibilities of individuals living in rich countries to relieve
the miseries of people living in less fortunate countries. Keeble draws
on his philosophical ideas about responsibility to explore the meaning
and possibility of global justice in the post-9/11 era, when national security has become the preoccupation of governments. She appeals to his
ideas about cosmopolitan ethics while discussing some of his proposals
for practically deploying such an ethic and draws from his work a more
optimistic view of international relations than is evident within current
government policies.
In chapter 6, Sharon Sutherland traces Braybrookes insight into the
importance of incrementalism to debates in public policy that he takes
up throughout his career, beginning with his very first book, A Strategy of Decision: Policy Evaluation as a Social Process, published with
C.E. Lindblom in 1963. In his ongoing efforts to make public policy
responsive to needs, Braybrooke has always recognized the importance
of developing institutional processes that ensure debate and revisability
as policymakers evaluate the impact of their efforts. She shows how
this approach is central to his major contribution to specific policy in
his work on traffic congestion (a subject of lifelong interest to him as
the son of a highway designer). This dynamic strategy is taken up and
vigorously argued most recently in his 2004 book Utilitarianism.
The section concludes in a different mood, with Steven Burnss essay Life of Pi and the Existence of Tigers (chapter 7). While Burns
does not discuss Braybrookes publications per se, he does demonstrate
an important aspect of Braybrookes well-known views about how an
individual ought to live ones life. As noted above, Braybrooke has
17
long understood that a productive intellectual life depends on living a

rich life overall, engaging in many areas of stimulating activity, especially the arts. His early studies involved work in literary criticism,
and his first appointment was in a program of study of great books of
Western civilization. Literary examples populate and illuminate all of
Braybrookes work. Moreover, as we see in Braybrookes own description of life as an academic (Appendix A), he thought it important to
finish out a day of scholarship by turning to other forms of intellectual
stimulation besides philosophy; he was, himself, particularly partial to
literature and satire. Thus, Burnss discussion of philosophical themes
present in the important novel Life of Pi pays tribute to Braybrookes
ideas about how a philosopher should engage with the world.
In Part II, Theoretical Engagement, we move from essays that explore some of the implications of Braybrookes work in practical or
worldly matters to ones that concentrate on some of the more theoretical
questions he has published on in greater abstraction. As a bridge, we begin this section with Meredith Ralstons helpful review of Braybrookes
work on the philosophy of social science, ranging from his 1965 collection, Philosophical Problems of the Social Sciences through to his
1998 book, Moral Objectives, Rules, and the Forms of Social Change.
Ralston explores Braybrookes efforts to distinguish three overlapping
schools (naturalist, interpretive, and critical social science) that he proposes should be understood as offering mutual support and stimulation; each has a role to play in particular types of analysis. Ever the
peacemaker, Braybrooke argues that we are best served by a philosophy
that permits use of multiple methods according to the problem before us
rather than a single approach for all circumstances. In reviewing Braybrookes contribution to this literature, Ralston finds within it a position
that resonates with contemporary feminist epistemology and philosophy of science.
In chapter 9, Sue Campbell picks up a theme that is central to Braybrookes work on needs and all of his discussions of political philosophy, namely his rejection of philosophical egoism. She looks, in particular, at the way Braybrooke challenges the traditional philosophical
approaches to egoism in his book Natural Law Modernized (2001). Sue
18
Campbell joins him in asking why egoism is the default account of human motivation; she argues for an alternative starting point that begins
with reliance on moral sentiment as the basis for a more social theory
of motivation. Like Sherwin and Ralston, she finds within Braybrookes
work a conceptual apparatus that is very close to the work of feminist
philosophers, though she also sees that his work would benefit from
making these connections more explicit and holding more firmly to the
vision feminists have developed.
In chapter 10, Richmond Campbell continues exploring questions
regarding the role of sentiment in moral judgment and focuses on an
important question in moral epistemology and meta-ethics. He discusses some of Braybrookes ideas regarding moral justification and
moral judgment. Richmond Campbell revisits a familiar philosophical impasse between cognitivists, who argue that moral judgments are
a form of belief that can be true or false, and non-cognitivists, who
claim that moral judgments are expressions of feeling or desire. These
are always represented as mutually exclusive options. He seeks to resolve this apparent impasse by drawing on an idea found in Natural
Law Modernized (2001), where Braybrooke suggests that David Hume
can be viewed as someone who embraces aspects of both positions. By
building on this insight, Richmond Campbell is able to offer a novel interpretation of moral judgments as constituting a complex, hybrid state,
thereby dissolving the apparent opposition between reason and emotion.
Chapters 11 and 12 continue to examine the implications of Braybrookes work for questions in moral epistemology. Both Michael Hymers and Tom Vinci use a recent essay of Braybrookes titled What
Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer to the Open-Question Argument Leave to Moral Judgments? to discuss themes about the nature
of moral knowledge. Hymers (chapter 11) discusses the importance of
Braybrookes claim that ethical justification does not have to be traced
back to meta-ethical justification. Taking a Wittgensteinian approach
to the nature of moral propositions, Hymers proposes that justification
and, in particular, certainty of moral propositions are a function of epistemic context, not semantic or empirical content. Vinci (chapter 12)
takes a different approach to the issues raised in Braybrookes stimulat-
19
ing paper. He argues that Braybrooke situates his account of moral rules
within a theory of meta-ethics. Vinci discusses the structure of this account within the broader theory of formal foundationalism with analogy
to epistemic justification. This connection provides a useful model for
understanding Braybrookes account of moral justification, but it is not
without difficulties of its own.
We then follow Braybrooke in his decision to turn to formalism to
capture some of the important ideas regarding the ways in which societies actually come to decisions and set (and change) policies. In chapter
13, Peter Schotch explores the intersection between Braybrookes interests in moral philosophy and social science. Through graphic representations, Schotch helps to make accessible the formal work he, Braybrooke, and Brown have done on rules in order to render more visible
Braybrookes understanding of the place of political economy in a rulebased picture of morals. This essay draws together the ways in which
the concept of rules runs through a substantial body of Braybrookes life
work.
In chapter 14, Bryson Brown continues to expand on the important
and difficult role that rules play in Braybrookes approach to moral and
political thought. He reminds us that in Logic on the Track of Social
Change the authors explain how rules combine both descriptive and
normative features. In this essay, Brown draws on the work of Wilfrid Sellars to help elaborate the nature of normativity that is built into
their shared understanding of the nature of rules.
Together, these essays pay our respect to David Braybrooke in the
best way we know how, by critically engaging with his work. It reflects
his teaching that philosophy is a conversation, best pursued through
open discussion. David describes his principal interest in all of his work
as that of being useful. In that, he has admirably succeeded.
I trust this Introduction has given the reader a sense of the importance of David Braybrookes contributions to the literature in many dimensions of philosophy. That sense will surely be confirmed by reading
the full volume. I may not, however, have succeeded in conveying the
other side of David Braybrooke: his irreverent, irrepressible determination to have fun. At his urging, we have included, as Appendix A, some
excerpts from an essay he published in the Dalhousie Review in 1985. It

describes the saga of his efforts to have a description of the way a professor spends his time in the summer months included in a document
being prepared by the faculty of arts and science for the government. In
it, he reveals his sense of how he himself spends his days and also his
distinctive sense of humour as he pokes gentle fun at colleagues who,
to his mind, take this question altogether too seriously.
1.4
References
Braybrooke, David. 1965. Philosophical Problems of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan.
1968. Three Tests for Democracy: Personal Rights, Human Welfare, Collective Preference. New York: Random House.
1987. Meeting Needs. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
1987. Philosophy of Social Science. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, Foundations of Philosophy Series.
1998.Philosophy of Social Science, Contemporary Theories (Schools).
In E. Craig, ed., Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 8: 838-47.
London: Routledge.
1998. Moral Objectives, Rules, and the Forms of Social Change.
Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
2001. Natural Law Modernized. Toronto: University of Toronto
Press.
2004. Utilitarianism: Restorations; Repairs; Renovations. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press.
2005. Analytical Political Philosophy: From Discourse, Edification. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Braybrooke, David, Bryson Brown, and Peter Schotch. 1995. Logic
on the Track of Social Change. Oxford: Clarendon Press, Clarendon
Library of Logic and Philosophy.
Braybrooke, David, and C.E. Lindblom. 1963. A Strategy of Decision: Policy Evaluation as a Social Process. New York: The Free
Press.
Part One:
Practical Engagement
Chapter 2
Teaching Class: Justice and

Privatization in Education
NATHAN B RETT
Abstract
This paper looks at some of the issues raised by recent moves toward
privatization in education. I begin the debate over private-versus-public
services by considering the claim that a private system is a more efficient
way of achieving the goals of education. The next section takes up this
question of differences in goals by examining some basic differences in
the normative structures of the public and private spheres. Using (and defending) David Braybrookes principle of equality in meeting needs, the
paper concludes by arguing that the privatization of educational services
undermines in important ways the pursuit of equality of opportunity.
2.1
Introduction
David Braybrooke has been a stern critic of moves toward privatization that began with the Thatcher and Reagan regimes in Britain and
the United States respectively. In his work he has treated education
An early draft of this paper was present at the Society for Applied Philosophy Meetings:
Education in the 21st Century, Oxford, England, June 2002. I would like to thank Steven Burns
and Susan Sherwin for their helpful editorial comments. Thanks also to Caroline Sequeira for her
help in editing.
23
24
CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT
as a need that requires a public response. This paper explores the implications of moves toward privatization in education and attempts to
show why education should not continue down this path toward privatization. This will involve considering some basic differences between
public and private enterprises. It will also explore the implications of
Braybrookes views that education is one of the basic needs of human
beings and that a just society aims at equality in meeting needs.1
Judged from the viewpoint of equality, the political regimes that
have held power in much of the West over the past twenty-five years
have been a disaster. We have witnessed a widening of the gap between the rich and the impoverished countries of the world. Wealth has
become concentrated in the hands of fewer individuals. While some
people are enormously wealthy, average real wages and employment
in full-time work have decreased. In North America (and elsewhere)
more wage earners have been moved into flexible categories of work,
where they do not have job security or health and retirement benefits.
Meanwhile, the power of labour unions to resist these changes has been
greatly diminished by the globalization of production and markets.
These changes toward greater social inequality have also been evident in the reorganization of our educational establishments. Over the
past ten years, for example, the amount of public money going to Canadian universities has (in real terms) been reduced, while the costs of
this education have continued to rise. One result has been dramatic increases in university tuition. In my own province (Nova Scotia), tuition
has increased by 100 per cent over the last ten years. This is not exceptional. A recent study of state-supported universities in the United
States found somewhat lower rates of tuition increases (107 per cent
over twenty years) but reflected the same shift toward university education accessible only to those who can afford it.2
1 See (Braybrooke, 1987a) Chapter 2 Section 2 Course of Life Needs, and Chapter 4 Section
5 Equality in Meeting needs, 143-50. See also Section 6 below.
2 Jacques Steinberg, More Family Income Committed to College, New York Times, 2 May
2002. While the average amount each state spent on higher education per student rose by 13
percent over that period, to $6,747, state institutions raised their tuition and fees by 107 percent, to
$3,512, the study [Losing Ground] found. See Losing Ground: A National Status Report on the
Affordability of American Higher Education, p. 9, http://www.highereducation.org/
reports/losing ground/affordability report final bw
2.1. INTRODUCTION
25
It does not take an expert to see that these changes will foster greater
social inequality. Given that education is a central need of human beings
and that it connects in dramatic ways with the meeting of other needs,
this inequality is an important source of injustice.
There is a corresponding differentiation of opportunity within the
universities, as administrators (like their counterparts in industry) have
sought a cheaper and more flexible workforce by increasing the proportion of untenured and part-time employees, who lack security and
benefits and work for about one-third of the salary of tenured faculty.3
At the same time, universities have become more and more dependent
on private corporations to fund research programs. This has meant that
private enterprise has sometimes been in a position to determine what
questions will be investigated and even what findings will be made public.4 Though this is a direct affront to the ideals of a liberal university,
it may not directly contribute to inequality. But indirectly it does. Since
these very corporations are the chief sources of the hierarchal dispersion
of wealth, research that contributes to their power will ultimately have
an inegalitarian impact.
Public schools, too, have experienced undermining cuts to their funding. The Halifax School Board recently decided to cut the funding for
French immersion schools. Private schools will be the beneficiaries of
this change, as parents who can afford it move their children to the private schools. In some provinces (and many states in the United States),
such moves to private schools are being reinforced by tax policies that
allow tuition to count as a tax deduction. There is a corresponding removal of funds from the public system. Like the universities, public
schools have sought partnerships with private industry as a replace3 See Wesley Shumar, College for Sale: A Critique of the Commodification of Higher Education (London: The Falmer Press, 1997), 52-6. Shumar claims that underpaid part-time faculty now
do 50 per cent of the teaching on average in U.S. universities. Canadian faculty have been resisting
this trend. (Though it took a protracted strike to settle all of the issues, the Faculty Association at
Dalhousie University was successful in holding the line at 10 per cent.)
4 In Canada the names David Healy and Nancy Olivieri come to mind in connection with
corporate attempts to control findings about dangerous side effects of products. (These researchers
brought to light attempts to control their negative findings about pharmaceutical drugs.). See J.
Thompson, P. Baird, and J. Downie, The Olivieri report: The Complete Text of the Report of the
Independent Inquiry Commissioned by the Canadian Association of University Teachers (Toronto:
James Lorimer, 2001), http://www.dal.ca/committeeofinquiry.
26
ment for public funding. The results can be alarming: corporations with
poor environmental records, for example, are sometimes supplying the
video materials used in classroom discussions of environmental issues.5
I begin the debate over private-versus-public services by considering the claim that a private system is a more efficient way of achieving
the goals of education. This brief discussion supports two (related) conclusions. The claim of greater efficiency is (often) used in a way that
makes it true a priori, though it poses as an empirical claim. Second, efficiency comparisons will not be valid if public and privatized systems
have different goalsthat is, assume different answers to the question,
Efficient at what? The next section takes up this question of differences in goals by examining some basic differences in the normative
structures of the public and private spheres. The account contrasts the
impartiality of public norm structure with the partiality of that which is
private. This account is then applied to the question of equality in education. I argue that the privatization of educational services is an important
step away from conditions of social justice. In defending education as
a public service (comparable to a public health system) I utilize David
Braybrookes views that education is one of the basic needs of human
beings and that a just society aims at equality in meeting those needs. I
conclude that the shift of educational services into the private sector is
an important step away from conditions of social justice.
2.2
Privatization and Costs
Privatization occurs when some practice or enterprise that has been

within the public domain, and financed through tax resources, is moved
to the private sector and subjected to the competitive environment of
the market. Advocates and opponents of privatization of services, such
as education and health care, both make claims of greater efficiency in
5 For
examples, see Maud Barlow and Heather Robertson, Class Warfare: The Assault on
Canadas Schools (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 1994): A Dow Chemical sponsored video, Traces
of Today, created in conjunction with an educational marketing company, Modern Talking Pictures
Service, claims scientific studies and practical experience around the world have shown that
incinerators are an environmentally safe method for disposing of combustible material, including
plastics (81).
2.2. PRIVATIZATION AND COSTS
27
defending their positions. The former see increased efficiency as a necessary result of removing a non-competitive public bureaucracy. The
latter see privatization itself as necessarily introducing extra layers of
profit-makers and hence expenses.
2.2.1 Efficiency
The ideology of neoconservatism, currently dominant in the political decisions of Western democracies, views privatization as progress,
a change toward increased efficiency, reduced taxes, and ultimately a
higher standard of living. Bringing services into the private sector is,
for many proponents, a moral imperative. Even if public operation of
the education or health care systems provided care equivalent to that
provided by a private system at less cost,6 many proponents of privatization would be against it because opportunities for private enterprise
are lost. But many advocates of this new economy would find the
idea of greater efficiency in a public system simply incredible. On this
view, a public service bureaucracy is inefficient by definition. Moreover,
state-run monopolies on health care or education involve an absence of
competition, which protects inefficiencies. Adherents of this political
view seem not to notice that the market itself can produce monopolies
and provide room for vast corporate bureaucraciesorganizations that
impose costs and exercise power but contribute nothing of value to others in society.7
There is an ideology of the left that might be described in equivalent
terms. According to this view, whatever is done for profit is necessarily done at someones expense and is therefore less efficient. Hence, a
direct provision of services through the public sector is inherently more
6 According to the Council of Canadians (www.canadians.org) total health care spending in
Canada - under public health careis $3,298 per person as compared with $7,000 per person
under the private system in the United States. The Canadian system covers all persons; one person
in seven is not covered under the U.S. system. In terms of life expectancy, Canada rated secondhighest worldwide, the United States twenty-fifth.
7 Many private sector institutions can be described in these termse.g., those involved in
currency speculation, misleading advertising, and organizations of the sort revealed by the collapse of WorldCom and Enron in the United States. Scrutiny of such cases reveals that sometimes the removal of red tapederegulationhas contributed remarkably to the inefficiency of
our economies.
28
efficient. In both of these positions one can find a claim that is true a priori. Clearly, eliminating unnecessary bureaucracy will reduce costs. Of
course, there is a cost in providing government services that we ignore
at our peril when we speak of health care or public education provided
free of charge. On the other hand, it is true that privatization involves
the introduction of profit-makersor perhaps layers of theminto a
system that provides these services; and these changes necessarily introduce costs. The huge cost of private medical health insurance in the
United States is a case in point. But in neither account is it a necessary
truth that the overall cost will be greater.
2.2.2
Benefits
Surely we can compare a publicly run British Rail with its privatized
counterpart, and compare them across several dimensions, in arriving at
an assessment of greater or lesser efficiency. But to do this, we will have
to ensure that we take into account any change in benefits. If privatized
trains no longer run on time, or no longer service outlying areas, or are
more prone to deadly crashes, the fact that less is being spent shows
us nothing about efficiency. Similarly, if changes in the provision of
medical or educational services turn out to be less expensive because
only those who can afford them get treated or educated, then we can
hardly say that this is more efficient until we have reached agreement
about this change of benefits. Typically, changes toward privatization
end up serving a smaller part of the population and differentiating in the
level of benefits received by those who are served.
The opposition between these alternatives, therefore, is not merely a
question of fact about the best way of doing the same things. The centre
of the dispute is inevitably a normative dispute about goals. In the case
at hand, it involves disagreement about the proper aims of education.
To privatize is to move in the direction of exclusion and competition. A
public solution, on the other hand, demands inclusion and cooperation.
Moreover, there are different criteria of desert and entitlement that lie
in the normative backgrounds of the two approaches. Even the ideal of
equality is differently interpreted, depending on whether the approach
2.2. PRIVATIZATION AND COSTS
29
is a public or private one.8

This claim that public and private educational services involve essentially different goals may seem to be contradicted by facts of which
we are all well aware. Public and private schools have existed side by
side in many communities for years. It is probably true, as well, that the
public system evolved out of private beginnings.9 Students often move
from one system to the other; exam results from the two systems can
be compared; and often the curricula are very similar. It would seem to
be nonsense of the sort I have just depicted to insist on a priori grounds
that these schools have fundamentally different aims.
This point is helpful in clarifying the object of this critique. In raising doubts about the privatization of education, I am primarily interested
in changes that aim to move educational services more fully under the
control of private corporations. Traditional private schools (as opposed
to schools run by businesses such as the Edison Corporation) do not
raise all of the same worries. Typically, the traditional private school is
not run with the primary goal of making and increasing profits. These
schools are voluntary associations aimed at providing distinct and often
superior educational opportunities for the students they serve. However,
even traditional private schools give rise to some questions of justice
that are of concern here. Because they give wealthier parents a chance
to provide educational opportunities that are unavailable to others, they
exist in conflict with a sense of justice that demands equality in education. I will return to this.
In the reassignment of education more fully to the market, schooling
becomes a commodity which students consume, and the logic of the
market governs essential decisions about what will be taught and how
instruction will be carried out. Promoters of privatization argue that the
competitive conditions of the market provide the best environment for
the preservation and enhancement of what we value independently of
the market. A Mercedes is a better car than a Lada despite (and perhaps
8 The sense of equality endorsed by a public system goes beyond mere equality of
opportunityif that is construed to mean only an equal chance to compete; it includes adjustments aimed at equalization relative to need.
9 See Myron Lieberman, Public Education: An Autopsy (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
Press, 1993), 14-16.
30
because of) the fact that the Mercedes was manufactured by a profitseeking corporation and the Lada was not. The process of extracting a
profit does not entail that automotive standards were sacrificed. On the
contrary, the successful producer is efficiently producing what people
want. And what people want must meet certain standards. Likewise,
it may seem, the goals of education could be pursued and enhanced by
corporations dedicated to making a profit by advancing the same goals
endorsed by public education. On the other hand, a system of public
education may be producing the educational equivalent of a Lada, not
doing a good job of serving the goals of liberal education.
One problem with this argument is the assumption that profit-driven
exchanges in the market can provide and enhance whatever we value.10
If this were true, then prostitution would be the ideal form of sexual intimacy. Not all that we value can be reduced to or mirrored by commodity value.11 Education is a part of what makes us fully human, and to allow profitability to dictate its goals is to treat humanity as a mere means.
A second problem is the oversimplified conception of the market that is
assumed when we claim that the markets can provide superior means
to whatever we want. A missing element in this picture is the modern
markets role in producing the educational needs that it then satisfies.
To survive in the competitive modern economy, vendors of a product
or service must stimulate consumer demand through advertising. Another key to success in modern markets lies in selling products that must
be replaced and services that will need to be repeated. Of course, advertising and obsolescence can work together. Building obsolescence into
products may backfire unless one also builds it into the thinking of con10 Why isnt everything for sale? asks Elizabeth Anderson in Value in Ethics and Economics
(Cambridge Harvard University Press, 1993). Her answer is that we have a plurality of values,
many of which cannot be captured in commodity values (chap. 8).
11 But here a common point of the defenders of privatization arises: teachers are paid for what
they do. If profiting were incompatible with what we value about education, then it is hard to see
why it is not already devalued. That teaching is financed and organized under a market system
instead of a tax-based public system will not alter the fact that teachers are already teaching for
profit. One reply to this is that teachers would be doing something else if their motivation were
simply to profit from what they are doing. This reply has some salience: teaching is not (most of
the time) alienated labour; it is generally valued intrinsically. But the point seems to remain: if pay
cheques do not corrupt teaching, why would it be changed for the worse through full incorporation
into the market? We will have to dig deeper.
2.3. TWO NORMATIVE CONTRASTS
31
sumers by getting them to believe that whatever is not new is obsolete.

As education moves further into the private sector, these aspects of the
market will become increasingly important. Students and potential students will be further targeted by advertisers. In the competitive market,
forms of education that are profitably served will be naturally selected
over those that are not. The market may not place a premium on critical
thinking or the exploration of history. Nor will it be sensible for those
directly motivated to increase profits to convey those skills that liberate by enabling a person to learn and think for herself. Rather, market
success will be achieved and sustained by teaching quite specific skills
that rapidly become obsolete. This will mean that a market system can
be expected to move toward specialization of the curriculum. Not only
will specific skills be more easily standardized and tested, they will also
provide an education market that sustains itself as people return to be
retooled to cope with the changing conditions of the job market.
2.3 Two Normative Contrasts between Public and Private

To advance the discussion of privatization in education, I want to consider at a more abstract level some differences between the public and
private approaches. On the view that I defend, exclusion and partiality
are essential features of the domains we refer to as private. This means
that we should be particularly vigilant where social changes involve privatizing what has been a public matter. It does not mean that we should
always prefer public to private solutions of problems. On the contrary,
being exclusive and partial is sometimes a virtue. Let me explain.
2.3.1
Exclusion
A private sphere is one in whichin some respectsa person or

group is to be left free from interference and from public review or
scrutiny. When we use the contrast between public and private nor This section derives from a discussion of the public-private divide in relation to patents
on living things in my Private Life: Reflections on Privacy, Patents and Biotechnology,
written for the Law Commission of Canada. See New Perspectives on the PublicPrivate
Divide (Vancouver: UBC Press, 2003), chap. 3.
32
matively to mark the sphere of individual autonomy, the private sphere

consists of those types of decisions and actions from which the control
of the state ought to be excluded. Likewise, the right to privacy is the
right to exclude others from information about ourselves. The most obvious connections between privacy and exclusion, of course, are those
involved in private property. Property is private when there is a right
to use and control something together with the right to exclude others
from its use. Private enterprise is structured around such private property rights. Apart from some rights to exclude, we would not have any
normative sense in which anything could be private.
2.3.2
Partiality
Private matters are also, in some respects, immune from generalization

tests that apply to public matters. Along some dimension of decisionmaking, it is permissible, within the various private spheres, to treat like
cases differently. That is, the various private spheres involve relations
of partiality among persons.12 This needs explanation by means of
examples. Let me take relations of family and friendship as paradigms
of private relations. In being part of a family, or in having friends, I
am (normatively) connected with specific people in ways that I am not
related to others. These relations between certain specific people and
myself are relations of partiality. If I treat my friends and family as if
they mattered to me no more than anyone else, I mistreat them. I can
recognize that two children are equally needy and still be obliged to
treat one preferentially, because one child is mine. I am partial to my
friends in the same way, and rightly so, according to the moral outlook
that prevails in most societies. In entering into promises and contracts, I
establish further relations of partiality. I can no longer treat the interests
of A and B as of equal importance in all respects, if I have promised
something to A but not to B. Much of our normative world is comprised
of such relations of partiality. A good chair of an academic department
will act in a way that favours her department over others, just as a good
12 See Thomas Nagel, Equality and Partiality (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), esp.
chap. 2.
2.3. TWO NORMATIVE CONTRASTS
33
leader of a corporation will work for its goals and those of its shareholders over the interests of others. Within the outlook that the privacy
of property establishes (taken by itself), the owner of private property
need not concern himself with the fact that others have far greater need
for these resources than he does.
All of these partial viewpoints exist in contrast withand often in
tension withpublic viewpoints that demand impartiality. In some
contexts, the types of loyalties that define the relationships just considered become matters of unfairness and injustice. A judge cannot take
pride in giving lighter sentences to her friends. A teacher treats his students unfairly if he plays favourites. There is, in fact, a perspective of
public reason from which all such specific relations of partiality can appear to be vices. This viewpoint has sometimes been thought to define
the outlook of reflective morality.13 But it is a mistake to suppose that
partiality can be eliminated from a defensible reflective morality. It is
true that loyalties can easily be, and often have been, taken to excess. A
normative world constructed entirely from such partial relations would
be one from which justice had disappeared. But the partialities involved
in friendship and citizenship are notlike (say) racismsomething that
we should strive to overcome. A world of wholly utilitarian impartiality,
in which people are rendered free from commitments to specific others,
and in which caring (in this sense) and loyalty disappear, is itself not
a worthy ideal of human perfection. A justifiable social system will
incorporate and protect both of these normative structures.
In claiming that partiality is a constitutive feature of what is private, I
am not saying that impartiality plays no role within areas of life that are
predominantly private. It has often been said that a good parent treats
her children equally. But this is not to deny that relations of partiality are a constitutive element of the family. My contention is that such
relations of partiality are essentially involved in the private spheres un13 This claim represents a tradition that includes most of moral philosophy, including philosophers as diverse as Plato and Hume. For a critique of the view, see, e.g., Bernard Williamss
discussion of integrity in A Critique of Utilitarianism, in J.J.C. Smart and B. Williams, Utilitarianism: For and Against (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1973), and Nagel, Equality
and Partiality. The view has also been questioned by some feminists who defend an ethic of
care, e.g., Carol Gilligan, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Womens Development
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982).
34
der discussion. On the other hand, partialities may be involved in the

public spheres that comprise our social world. But partiality is not a
defining feature of what is public; and it is not what we are after when
we designate something as a matter of public interest or responsibility.14
It seems clear that we can end up with the various lines between public and private drawn in the wrong place. We are prepared to condemn
a totalitarian state in which there is little by way of protection for autonomous decision or informational privacy. The special relationships
of partiality are an important aspect of any life worth living. But a social
world built entirely (or predominantly) out of partialities, where there
is no public perspective from which human actions are constrained by
reference to impartial standards, is also not a plausible ideal.
2.3.3
The Public-Private Divide in the Real World
In our everyday social world the public and private do not exist as neatly
isolated spheres (despite our use of this term). The normative differences between the public and private that I have described in this section are ideal types that never correspond precisely to our actual situation. In the real world the public and private exist in combination with
each other. Systems of private property and enterprise, for example, are
always dependent upon public law to provide a basis for a certain organization of ownership and competition. Public services, on the other
hand, are always provided in ways that involve some dependence on
private markets in goods and services. Moreover, public services are
generally15 provided by decisions of government, and the government
(in a democratic state) is the representative of the public interest. But
governments can (of course) fail in this task of representation. Governments can become the representative of private corporations, for exam14 I am also not arguing or assuming that partiality (and hence privacy) necessarily connects
with egoism, with the pursuit of self-interest. Not all forms of partiality involve the promotion of
self-interest, although, of course, this is a highly important manifestation of partiality. The kind of
partiality that is involved in carefor example, care for the members of ones familycan involve
great sacrifices of the time and energy that might have been devoted to ones own projects. The
chair of a department can impose costs on herselffor the sake of the department. In times of
conflict, the partiality of loyalty to a state can cost a person his life.
15 There are also non-governmental organizations.
2.4. EDUCATION, EQUALITY, AND CHOICE
35
ple, and act in ways that are contrary to the public interest. In light of
these features of our actual situation, one might wonder whether there
is any point in drawing the sharp contrast between public and private
that I have elaborated. One might infer from the complex integration of
public and private that there is no real division between these two and
that privatization is itself intelligible only as an abstraction.
This would be a mistake. It would be comparable to the mistake
of thinking that there is no useful division between utilitarian and Kantian (or respect for person) ideals, because in our world of everyday
decisions and institutions these ideals are integrated with each other in
complex ways. These different norm systems sometimes complement
and sometimes combat each other; but there is no adequate understanding of the normative bases of our institutions that does not include both
perspectives. There is a difference between policies that move us further
toward an entrenchment of individual rights, for example, and those that
subordinate such rights in the pursuit of a higher level of general welfare. The 1982 entrenchment of a Charter of Rights in the Canadian
Constitution is an example of the first sort of change (though the Charter itself aims to achieve a careful balance between consideration of
individual rights and the public good). More recently, we have seen the
introduction of anti-terrorist laws in both the United States and Canada
that impose new security measures at some cost to individual rights to
privacy and freedom from search. Understanding the abstract differences between these two theories is essential to understanding what is
going on in our social world despite the fact that the real world does
not provide examples of institutions which exemplify either in isolation from the other. It is in this same spirit that the normative division
between public and private should be understood.
2.4
Education, Equality, and Choice
Obviously no answers to questions about privatization in education follow directly from these abstract differences between the public and private spheres. But these contrasts suggest importantly different visions
of education, both of which capture matters of importance to us. One
36
is the image of public education in a just and democratic society. From

this viewpoint, social justice requires that opportunities for education
be provided on a basis that is substantively equal. Education is important to the success of the lives people live. A society that shows equal
concern and respect to its citizens will not allow wide disparities in the
educational opportunities that it provides. Those who do not know what
is going on in their world and in their society will choose from an impoverished range of options. They will compete with others for jobs and
opportunities at a disadvantage. They will not have an effective voice
in the selection of leaders and policies in their community. The fact
that a child comes from a poor family should not mean that she also
has to contend with a poor school. Even if the poverty of her family
is a function of the choices and lack of effort of her parents (which it
often isnt) this is no fault of hers, and it can provide no justification
for thinking that she deserves a less adequate education than children of
more well-to-do parents.
Set against this egalitarian image is a nest of intuitions about the responsibility of the family in relation to education. We actually have a
social system that is not egalitarian, but dramatically hierarchal in many
respects, in which there are better and worse jobs, houses, neighbourhoods, universities, and so forth. Viewed from within this hierarchy, it
would be odd to suppose that, although in other respects well-to-do parents are free to confer advantages on their children that are unavailable
to less fortunate members of the community, they can provide no advantages in relation to education. Education is one of the keys to success
in upward mobility, and those who have the means often regard themselves as having a right to spend their income in ways that give their
children an advantage.
The educational systems that have developed within liberal democracies are an uneasy compromise between these two ways of thinking
about educational opportunities. State-funded public education is underwritten by arguments that lead in the direction of equal access and
equal opportunity. But private money can often be utilized to obtain
access to alternative superior schooling in private institutions.
37
2.4.1 The Demands of Justice

It will be useful to briefly contrast two extremes on this continuum of
public-versus-private norm systems in their application to education.
On one side (call it the left) is a system from which parental discretion
is removed. This could be done on the model of public health care as it
is provided in many countries (including Canada)where a two-tier
system is deemed to be unjust and private medical services are effectively excluded by legal regulations. Applied to education, this would
mean the elimination of private schools. The sort of social system defended by Marx and many modern socialists requires that educational
opportunities be allocated equally and in a way that reflects need and
ability. Of course, this view does not require exactly the same treatment
of every child, irrespective of their differencesany more than a public health care system requires the delivery of the same medicines or
treatments to everyone regardless of their medical condition. But a socialized system of education does reject the idea that opportunities open
to a child should depend on the wealth or the choices of her family.
One could also generate arguments for a completely public system
from a liberal theory such as that of Rawls.16 A decision from behind
a veil of ignorance would provide no good reasons for a caste system in
which the resources and quality of early education available to children
depends on the wealth and choices of their parents. As we move up from
primary education, emerging differences in effort and talents of students
will provide some basis for differentiation under the difference principle,17 since investing more in bright and willing students will sometimes
provide benefits that can make everyone better off. But, again, there is
no reason to suppose that differences selected in this way will correlate
with the wealth and choices of parents. A system of public scholarships
would be necessitated to implement this use of the difference principle.
Of course, the degree to which public schools actually provide substantively equal opportunity is limited. Often, there are quite substantial funding differences between one school district and another
16 John
Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1971), 136-42.
17 The difference principle permits inequalities only where they are to the advantage of the least
well-off member of society.
38
(e.g., between middle-class, suburban neighbourhoods and the innercity schools, or between urban and rural schools). Recently in the
United States, Fourteenth Amendment guarantees of equal treatment
have provided the basis for legal decisions against the inequalities that
have often resulted from differences in the property tax base from which
schools generally have derived their funding; but other judgments, in
both the United States and Canada, protect parental choices in relation
to the education of their children.18
2.4.2
Free-Market Choices
On the other side (call it the right) is the complete elimination of public schools in favour of a free market in education.19 Education, on this
view, should be opened up to a free market and treated as a product like
any other within that market. Like food and housing (which, of course,
are necessary to meet basic needs), and like automobiles and computer
systems (which satisfy less vital interests) under a private system, educational products would not be available at uniform price or quality.
Opened to freedom of choice, the educational market can be predicted
to disperse educational opportunities as widely as the market has dispersed the quality of other products that we consume (think of the range
in quality and price of food, houses, computers, automobiles). Proponents of free-market education might ask, rhetorically, what crude form
of materialism would permit individuals to reflect their values in the
choices they make over wines or automobiles but deny them this opportunity in relation to the education of their children?
There are versions of both libertarian and conservative political
moralities that support such an educational policy. Consider a libertarian view. If children are taken to be the property of their parents (in a relatively strong sense), then parents are free to invest in their childrenor
to put their money elsewherejust as they are free to invest in improve18 A 1973 U.S. Supreme Court case, Rodriguez v. San Antonio Independent School District,
actually held that inequalities of funding were not a violation of equal protection, since education
is not a fundamental interest subject to judicial review and states do not have to provide education
at all. But subsequent decisions in many state supreme courts have found reason to disagree and
have held that unequal funding is unconstitutional. See Lieberman, Public Education, 206.
19 Lieberman defends such a proposal in Public Education.
39
ments to (other!) real estate.20 This form of libertarianism attempts to

articulate a political morality within the private perspective from which
substantive universalization tests are excluded. (All adult human beings
have the same negative right to choose lives for themselves. But none
has any positive right that these choices be realizable.) The libertarian theory takes individual choice to be its central concern, but it finds
no objection to a social system that offers a wide range of choices to
some that it effectively excludes from others. In this respect, it presents
a politics of partiality. The social system that emerges from the patterns of individual choices is one in which the natural differences (e.g.,
in talents) among human beings are likely to be amplified because the
talented will be rewarded (by the choices of others) with additional resources and powers. As long as this is the result of choices that adults
have actually made without coercion, there is nothing wrong (according to this view) with a system that offers widely varying educational
opportunities to children21 (including none at all).
A defender of free enterprise in education need not accept this radical version of libertarianism with its counter-intuitive implications about
children. The view can be defended on the basis of a conservative position founded centrally on family values. This view credits parents
with a right to control the education of their children, a right that is
sufficiently strong that it trumps competing social considerations. Of
course, such a right would be no guarantee that there are educational
options that match the choices that parents will want to make. But (on
this view) it is assumed that this is more likely under policies that place
education more fully within the economy of the free market. Families
can be expected to want to provide their children the best education they
can afford.
20 See Jan Narveson , The Libertarian Idea (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1988),
chap. 19, for a discussion of The Problem Children, in which Narveson explores some of the
troubling implications of the view that children are private property.
21 Narveson, chap. 20.
40
2.5 The Priority of Justice

By what standards are we to reconcile in a principled way this opposition between individual choice (and privilege) in education versus demands of justice and equal treatment? This question is central to debates
over privatization. The question also presents a dilemma with which
many of us have struggled personally, in trying to do the best that we
can for our own children while recognizing that there are issues of justice at stake and that it is not possible to justify a system that privileges
some children over others. Ultimately, I believe the clash that I have described rests on differing conceptions of the relation between the right
and the good (in the sense that Rawls uses this dichotomy).22 The libertarian and conservative positions described above subordinate public
matters (at least with regard to education) to individual adult decisions
about the good, about what is worth doing with ones life. The just
society is one in which the rules and institutions provide a framework
that protects the rights of individuals to make these choices. This view
is combined with a thesis about the relation between parents and children. Until a child has matured to the point where she can make rational
choices for herself, it is the parents right (libertarian view) or authority
and responsibility (conservative view) to make these life choices for her.
On the other hand, the egalitarian position that I have described assumes the priority of the right over the good. Individual freedom to act
and the scope of the freedom to make private commitments that involve
partiality to certain others are always subject to prior constraints of justice. Ronald Dworkin sums up the conflict that has been central to this
paper in the following way:
Notice what might seem to be a contradiction between two
ethical ideals most of us embrace. The first dominates our
private lives. We believe that we have particular responsibilities toward those with whom we have special relationships:
ourselves, our family, friends and colleagues ... We believe
that someone who showed equal concern for all members of
22 Rawls,
A Theory of Justice, 446-52.
2.5. THE PRIORITY OF JUSTICE
41
his political community, in his private life would be defective. The second ideal dominates our political life. The just
citizen, in his political life, insists on equal concern for all.23
The liberal answer to this conflict follows from the priority of justice:
A competent overall ethics must reconcile these two ideals.
They can be reconciled adequately, however, only when politics actually succeeds in distributing resources in the way
that justice requires. If a just distribution has been secured,
then the resources people control are morally, as well as
legally, theirs; using them as they wish, and as special attachments and projects require, in no way derogates from
their recognizing that all citizens are entitled to a just share.24
Applied to the issues raised by privatization in education, this resolution of the conflict between public and private values would cut fairly
deeply into the (supposed) right of individuals to provide privileged education for their children. It would also provide grounds to limit the
ways in which the market can disperse the resources of a community
and thereby lose the initially fair distribution of opportunities.
But here we should again return to the real world. We are not at all
likely ever to arrive at a new beginning in which the resources to which
individuals have access are evenly divided. In practice we will have to
live with incremental change, and we will have to be vigilant about incremental changes that take us even further from conditions of justice.
In devising social policy we will have to assume a wide dispersion of
wealth. It is against this background that we must consider how to structure the institutions that provide educational opportunities. Privatization
will move us further in the direction of choices that reflect private loyalties and interests. We have witnessed these changes in many industries,
from coal mining to airlines, and we can presume that these changes
23 Ronald Dworkin, Sovereign Virtue: The Theory and Practice of Equality (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 2000), 235.
24 Ibid.
42
will not be reversed. Is there something special about education that

should lead us to set it apart from full integration with the competitive
pressures of the market?
2.6
Education as a Human Need
In much of his work, David Braybrooke aims to reinstate the concept

of need in theoretical discussions of social policy.25 As Braybrooke
points out, need has never been displaced from the discourse of policymakers. Contemporary theoretical work in economic theory, political
philosophy, and ethics, on the other hand, has generally displaced talk
of needs by the concept of utility, and utility itself is analysed in terms
of preference.26 This is unfortunate, since the resolution of many problems of social policy requires a distinction between what is needed and
what is merely preferred. We can utilize this division in arguing that a
market-driven educational system will give us the wrong resolution of
the conflict between public and private opportunity in education.
In addition to the claim that education is one of the basic needs of
human beings, there are three claims defended by Braybrooke of particular relevance to the present problem. The first is a criterion of what
counts as a need. We can identify what is needed most easily by reference to its absence or insufficiency: failure to meet a need detracts from
a persons ability to function in the social roles that are appropriate to
him or her as a human being.27 The second is a normative thesis that
Braybrooke denominates the Priority Principle.28 According to this
principle (and common sense in matters of allocation) providing conditions in which human beings can meet their needs takes precedence
over permitting or enabling people to satisfy preferences for what is not
needed. A third claim concerns distributive justice: to the extent that
it is practical, a just society will aim to achieve equality in meeting
25 Braybrooke,
Meeting Needs (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987).

Does the Moral Force of the Concept of Needs Reside, and When? in Analytical
Political Philosophy: From Discourse, Edification (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005).
27 Meeting Needs, chaps 2 and 3.
28 Ibid., chap. 2.6, A Principle of Precedence.
26 Where
2.6. EDUCATION AS A HUMAN NEED
43
needs.29
Consider the first of these claims. In the sense at issue here, what
people genuinely need is what is necessary to their thriving as human
beings; and, conversely, the absence of what is needed undermines their
ability to function physically and in the social roles that make us human.
This is a thesis of modern natural law theory (natural law naturalized,
one might say).30 But this claim, too, captures what is common knowledge and common sense.31 As human beings, we need food and water
because without them we will cease to function at all; and with inadequate supplies well be impaired. Similarly, we need to acquire some
language abilities in order to function in the social roles that give us
our identities as individuals and members of cultures. A lack of some
linguistic abilitiesfor example, the capacity to read and writeleaves
a person unable to function well in the social roles required by modern
societies. The need for education is a generalization over a wide range
of capacities of this sort. But it also recognizes that a general level of
shared information is itself a condition of functioning adequately within
a modern society such as our own.
Second, given this conception of needs, the priority principle seems
to require little by way of justification. It is more important that we retain the capacity to function as human beings than to get exactly what
we want. The utility calculus of individuals will reflect this. But in aggregating preference satisfaction, there is no guarantee that the needs of
a few will not be outweighed by the preferences of many. That an automobile factory contaminates its immediate environment, leaving those
nearby without an adequate supply of clean air, may be deemed a small
price to pay for the greater wealth and economic opportunity that is generated by growth in an unregulated industryif we are simply trying to
maximize the satisfaction of preferences. Similarly, if we have a free
29 Ibid.,
chap. 4.5, Equality in Meeting Needs.

defends a version of natural law theory in Natural Law Modernized (Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 2001). The role of human needs in relation to what is universal in
morality is summed up at 239-41.
31 Obviously, the claim does not attempt simply to capture ordinary language. We are prone
to say such things as I need a drink or I need a second car. A view designed to explain and
elucidate the contrast between really needing something and merely preferring or wanting it must
exclude such claims.
30 Braybrooke
44
market in educational services, the costs of providing for those with special needs will be deemed too high and the benefits to low to be justified
in terms of economic good gained by the stockholders of competing private businesses. Of course, we could introduce legislationand some
communities have done sorequiring educational corporations to take
the responsibility of meeting such needs. But this is just to say that
we could hold the line on privatization by retaining public control over
this aspect of education. Neither the pursuit of utility nor the pursuit of
profit in a free market can be expected to capture the (intuitively plausible) policy of giving priority to needs over mere preferences.
Finally, what justification can be given for the idea that a just society
will afford its citizens an equal opportunity to meet their needs? I will
assume, as the context of this discussion, a level of affluence like that
of modern Western societies, in which there are more than sufficient
resources to meet the needs of the people. It is not necessary for some
to die in order that others live or for some to remain at home in order that
others receive an education. In these circumstances the argument is very
simple. The requirement of equality in meeting needs follows directly
from the priority principle. If there is enough to meet needs, but the
needs of some are not met, the allocation system is permitting some to
satisfy mere preferences while others do without what they need. Given
what needs are, this system will treat some people as if it did not matter
that they lack the resources to lead fully human lives while others are
able to enjoy luxuries. Braybrookes own argument against this degree
of imbalance involves showing that it constitutes ideal conditions for
exploitation.32 Some will be unable to meet their needs without serving
the interests of others. Far from being consistent with social justice, a
system of affluence that does not provide equal opportunity for meeting
needs maintains the essential conditions of oppression.33
But here we must consider an objection. Food is obviously a need
of human beings. It clearly does not follow directly from this that food
should be equally distributed or that there is something wrong with the
32 Meeting
Needs, 152-5.
152-5. Charity is a possible alternative to exploitation. It is not, in the circumstances
described, an escape from oppression, since it maintains the relation of dominance. For this reason
it is resented by those who are aware of the injustice of their condition.
33 Ibid.,
2.7. FAIR OPPORTUNITY
45
system in which food is made available by private enterprise and made

available in a way that generates a huge range of options in type, quality,
and price. A system of private enterprise in food may, in fact, enable
everyone to meet their needs in this respect. This is not to say, of course,
that our present system of private enterprise in food does adequately
meet the needs of all human beings. Clearly it doesnt. The point of the
objection is that, though food is a commodity that we need, justice does
not require that it be available on an equal basis. This is because food
does not just meet our needs; it also satisfies a wide range of preferences
that go beyond what is necessary to avoid starvation or incapacitation.
Similarly, while education is a human need, its acquisition satisfies a
wide range of preferences that go beyond what is needed for one to be
a fully functioning member of a modern society.
This point is obviously right. It is important to understand the implications of the fact that as human beings we have a need for education. It
is also important to see why a just society will provide the opportunity
for a minimum level of education on an egalitarian basis. The above
account provides some of the argument behind the ideals that led our
communities to a system of public education, one that is protected from
the operation of a free market. Braybrookes argument also enables us
to see how the absence of such a system creates the condition under
which people can be marginalized, exploited, and oppressed. But that
there is a need for education with these implications does not establish
what minimum is adequate. Nor will these considerations, by themselves, provide the basis for a thoroughgoing equality of opportunity in
education that extends from kindergarten to university.
2.7
Fair Opportunity
Given that there is not going to be a one-time redistribution of resources

(and if there were, it would soon be needed again), attempts to achieve
conditions that are consistent with a liberal conception of distributive
justice will have to rely on tax policies that redistribute wealth which
has been gained in circumstances that do not meet the conditions of justice. But whether tax policies move us closer to justice, are neutral, or
46
promote an even greater differentiation between economic classes will

depend upon the uses to which tax revenue is put. Systems of public
welfare and medicine - as well as educationdo redistribute wealth.
But often these systems fall far short of achieving conditions of equality
even with respect to needs. In many cases it would be absurd to suppose that they were intended to do so. But there are exceptions. When
Canadians defend universal medicare and resist a two-tier system (as
a large majority of Canadians do) it is because they see justice as requiring equality in meeting needs. Perhaps because the needs that are met
by education are less immediate, we do not find the same consensus that
a two- (or multi-) tier educational system is marked by injustice.
In education, meeting needs is necessary but not sufficient for meeting the conditions required by justice. Reflective comparison of public
institutions of welfare and medicine with education will reveal that the
former do not carry the same potential to move those who benefit from
them toward a more fair or just distribution of resources. A safety net is
just thata device that (when it functions successfully) prevents peoples situations from becoming dramatically worse. But lives of mere
subsistence, in which one does not perish or suffer incapacitation from
lack of food or insulin, should not be the lot of any members of an affluent communityas Braybrooke himself would be the first to insist.
Given what we know about human motivation, however, a system that
provided affluence irrespective of a persons contribution to the community would not work. Even if it did work, it would not be fair to those
who are productive contributors. So, differences in levels of wealth
can be expected even in a just community. But this does not mean, of
course, that the opportunities available to individuals in a just society
should themselves be quite uneven so that some struggle to gain even a
small portion of what others have handed to them.
What is needed is a system that moves us toward equality of opportunity in which differences in power and compensation are not simply reflections and amplifications of an arbitrary distribution of wealth.
Here public education could play a centrally important role. Given the
importance of training and knowledge in gaining access to careers, this
access should not be limited by factors that have nothing to do with a
2.8. TEACHING CLASS
47
persons effort or choices. In the real worldas opposed to that of theories in which we can contemplate a total reallocation of wealthpublic
education is one of the few institutions that has the potential to move us
toward conditions of distributive justice. Arguably, no other institution
has the same potential to redistribute resources in a way that achieves
some main aspects34 of the ideal of distributive justice that liberal theorists such as Rawls and Dworkin have defended.
At the centre of arguments for privatization in education, of course,
is a rejection of this liberal ideal. But (to translate this into one of the
metaphors of advocates of free enterprise) it is hard to see how one
could defend as fair a race in which some participants are allowed to
start well ahead of others. Pessimism will lead some to view this situation as inevitable. Self-interest may lead those who are well placed
to defend their advantage (perhaps by embracing this pessimism). But
what excuse shall we find for those philosophers who manage to convince themselves that it is a matter of entitlement that from the beginning some individuals have opportunities for self-improvement that others are denied?35
2.8
Teaching Class
If the argument of this paper is right, the normative division between

proponents and opponents of privatization is a deep one. It is an illusion
to suppose that this is really a debate over the most efficient means of
promoting goals that are held in common. But where does this leave us?
Is there some common ground on which to stand in order to decide (or
split the differences) between these two views?
34 A system in which people have an equal opportunity to competee.g., for marks and hence
for positions in higher educationdoes not solve the problem that human capacities are themselves unevenly distributed. The reduction of that form of arbitrarinessto the limited extent that
it is possibleis dependent on need-based policies.
35 Here I am appropriating the cadence and spirit of David Humes critique of the ancient
philosophers, whose metaphysical views (e.g., of natures horror of a vacuum) he deemed to be
the products of overactive imaginations. It ends: We must pardon children, because of their age,
poets because they profess to follow implicitly the suggestions of their fancy; But what excuse
shall we find to justify our philosophers in so signal a weakness? See A Treatise of Human
Nature, book 1, part 4, section 3.
48
According to Thomas Nagel in Equality and Partiality, there are no

grounds within contemporary morality to resolve this conflict in a principled way.36 I am not convinced that this sceptical thesis is right. But I
do see the difficulty involved in finding any resolution that does not beg
central questions. My own view accords with that of Dworkin (above),
which accords with the views of Kant and Rawls and Braybrooke
that the impartial demands of justice must set limits to our freedom to
pursue our own goals in ways that are exclusive and partial. Moreover, I
believe that it is a mistake to defend privatization on the basis of greater
choice in education, where the choices of some will be options that
they cant refuse, for services they would not otherwise accept. I am
aware, however, that this objection relies on an appeal to an impartial
standard, which proponents of privatization may refuse to concede.
On the other hand, I am confident that in the social world to which
our theories must be applied, we will continue to find both a sense of
justice and an acknowledgment that certain basic choices cannot rightly
be dictated by the state. Some compromise will have to be reached between the sense that justice rules out inequality in education and the
view that parents should be free to choose, within their means, the education that their own children will receive. Most reflective people will
find that they cannot avoid either of these perspectives, and, therefore,
they will be willing to accept ways of integrating them. The arguments
of this paper aim to reveal the ways in which moves toward privatization
bring with them important changes that conflict with the sense of justice
that lies in the background of our public systems of education.
Our theories must also face the reality of imperfection in the social
circumstances to which we apply them. We know that governments are
often very imperfect representatives of an impartially conceived public
interest. We know that some public schools will be good and others will
not, and that some public schools are sufficiently bad that parents will
be justified in taking their children out of them, if they can. But there are
ways of cheating public schools that will continue to offend our sense
of justiceif we are not duped by them. One of these ways of cheating
is to impoverish public schools by cutting their resources and then using
36 Nagel,
Equality and Partiality, 3-9.
2.8. TEACHING CLASS
49
their faults as enticements to private alternatives. Another is to utilize

tax credits for those who pay for private education as ways of removing
funding from public schools so that public schools are left with fewer resources and required to teach those with special needs whom the private
schools will not accept. These are familiar strategies of conservative
governments committed to privatization.
But (you may object) what if these alternative schools actually do
a better job? My answer to this question is given above. If those arguments are sound, they show that privatized schools will not be doing
the same job. They will be leading us away from the ideal of equality
that is a necessary condition of justice and democracy. In amplifying
the differences among us, they will be teaching class.
Chapter 3
Determining Health Care Needs

After the Human Genome Project:
Reflections on Genetic Tests for
Breast Cancer
S USAN S HERWIN
Abstract
This chapter appeals to Braybrookes conceptual work on needs and tries
to pick up where he leaves off at the end of Meeting Needs when he throws
up his hands in an honest admission that his theory cannot deal with the
bottomless pit of medical needs. I explore how the new genetics is expanding the scope of perceived medical needs and look particularly at the
genetic test for hereditary breast cancer now on the market. Building on
Braybrookes category of course-of-life needs, this chapter proposes developing a relational understanding of persons and of needs as a way to
avoid the deeper bottomless pit of medical need attached to the availability of genetic testing. If, as Braybrooke advises, we are careful in our
application of the concept of need, the pit takes on a different structure
and requires different strategies than is commonly assumed.
I had the opportunity to present earlier drafts of this paper at the University of British
Columbia (W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics), the University of Toronto (Joint Centre
for Bioethics), and Dalhousie University (Philosophy Department). I am very grateful for all the
thoughtful feedback I received on these occasions. I am especially grateful for the careful attention
provided by Lori dAgincourt-Canning, Jeffrey Nisker, and Christy Simspon.
51
52
CHAPTER 3. SUSAN SHERWIN
3.1 Introduction
In his important book Meeting Needs, David Braybrooke (1987) restores
the concept of human needs to a central place in policy considerations.
He is responding to a widespread tendency among modern economists
and liberal political theorists to substitute individual preferences for
the traditional role assigned the concept of needs in social policy deliberations. Braybrooke seeks to stem this tide and restore the concept
of needs to its rightful place where it can provide firm guidance in
the choice of social policies (5). He argues that without a clear understanding of what are legitimately classified as needs, it is difficult to
know how to organize government priorities and how to evaluate specific policies according to norms of justice and beneficence. The aim of
his book is to develop and defend a substantive, and usable, account of
the concept of needs.
Rather than producing an analytic definition of needs in terms of a
set of necessary and sufficient conditions, Braybrooke offers an account
of how the concept can (and should) be used in the practical evaluation
of social policies. He finds it necessary to distinguish between two types
of needs: course-of-life needs and adventitious needs. The former
deals with the needs associated with normal functioning in society and
the latter addresses conditional needs that derive from specific projects.
Thus, course-of-life needs are common to all and adventitious needs
reflect personal preferences. He believes that social policies should try
to ensure satisfaction of both types of needs, but, in most circumstances,
priority should be granted to course-of-life needs.
This comprehensive and persuasive account of the concept of human
needs makes a very important contribution to the role of ethics in public policy. Unfortunately, as Braybrooke is well aware, his insightful
account faces serious limitations. At the conclusion of the book, with
characteristic honesty and humility, he cites two problems he finds intractable. In each case, the concept of needs breaks down in the face
of needs so enormous that they threaten to drain all public resources.
The first area concerns efforts to apply a single, normative concept of
needs to the global community because the scale of scarcity and hu-
3.1. INTRODUCTION
53
man suffering shifts dramatically once we leave the borders of affluent

industrialized nations. The second problem area is that of medical services, particularly those associated with expensive, life-prolonging care
for the critically ill: providing the full range of medical services to
everyone whose life might be extended by such services might easily
exhaust all public resources.
I should, probably, follow the wisdom of Braybrookes leadership
and join him in throwing up my hands at the problem of applying his
substantive conception of human needs to the messy terrain of medicine,
but this does not seem to be an option for those of us who work squarely
in the area of health care ethics. According to the crumbling (but still
standing) pillars of the Canada Health Act, Canadians are entitled to
publicly funded medical and hospital treatments that are judged to be
medically necessary. Provinces and territories, responsible for implementing the unwieldy requirements of this Act, face the daunting task
of determining which services fall under the category of medical necessity or medical need and of deciding what level of service counts
as discharging this duty. These are moral, as well as political and economic, decisions, and a conception of human need that makes sense in
the context of high-tech medical care is an essential element for ethical
public policy in this realm.
In the mid-1980s, when Braybrooke was writing Meeting Needs,
the type of medical care that worried him was the sort associated with
resource-intensive, life-saving treatments: organ transplants, prolonged
time in the ICU, long-term dependence on expensive technological supports, and the nursing care required to maintain such efforts - that is, the
various sorts of life-extension opportunities medical science has been
generating over the last half-century. As if these problems were not
bad enough, we now find ourselves facing many new demands on our
health care system. One large set of these is associated with the growing knowledge that arises from the Human Genome Project and the related promise that access to genetic knowledge may sometimes lead to
actions that could significantly increase life expectancy for particular
individuals. This is a more indirect approach to life extension than the
interventions Braybrooke found overwhelming in the 1980s, but for the
54
people in question, the opportunity to avoid or delay life-threatening

illness may seem every bit as necessary as traditional life-prolonging
medical interventions. Arguably, these needs are even more important
to address, since if it is possible to avoid critical illness altogether, not
only will the lives of affected individuals be extended, but their health
will also be improved (unlike many in critical stages of illness who can
hope only for extended quantity of rather poor-quality lives).
My aim in this chapter is to reflect on how, as a society still (barely)
committed to a publicly funded health care system that is expected to
provide people with the health care they need, Canadians should reflect
on the added complexities that emerge from the potential explosion of
knowledge about individuals genetic disposition to develop particular
diseases. I shall focus, in particular, on the case of genetic testing
for mutations associated with some forms of hereditary breast cancer
as an illustration of how to think about the connection between genetic
knowledge and the concept of needs. I assume that we may soon see
many more options of genetic tests for susceptibility to other adult-onset
diseases; therefore, it is important to understand how to approach any
such test within a conceptual framework of medical needs. As well,
I hope that exploring the question of medical needs in the context of
genetic testing will bring us closer to addressing Braybrookes initial
worries about how to approach other forms of medical technology.
I shall argue that in order for an account of human needs to play
a meaningful role in public policy deliberations it must support an understanding of human beings as relational entities rather than the more
familiar conception of persons as distinct, self-contained beings. First,
I shall explain how the problem that confronted Braybrookes specific
account of human needs in 1987 could now be significantly more threatening as we move rapidly into the era of individualized genetic knowledge, and then I shall show why I believe that the resolution of this
conundrum rests with a reinterpretation of the concept of the individual
and, correspondingly, of the needs we should perceive as attached to
such an entity.
3.2. THE WORLD AFTER THE HUMAN GENOME PROJECT
55
3.2 The World after the Human Genome Project

The Human Genome Project (HGP) is now complete. From the beginning, its promoters have promised that the genetic knowledge revealed
by this massive research program would lead to an array of therapeutic interventions designed to correct genetic anomalies associated with
serious illnesses. To this point, that promise remains unfulfilled; no significant cures have yet emerged from the genetic knowledge generated
from the HGP, and most experts believe that any such innovations are,
at best, decades away (Kitcher 2001). If and when such therapies do appear, we may have to revisit the question of medical need yet again in
deciding which of the possible genetic corrections should be classified
as medically necessary. For now, however, there is more than enough
to concern ethicists if we limit our focus to the immediate impact of the
HGP. So far, its principal fruit is the ability to develop tests for genetic
susceptibility to a small but growing number of particular diseases.
Heralding this new era of genetic knowledge is the BRCAnalysis
test developed and marketed by Myriad Genetics Inc. to identify many
of the thousands of mutations that occur at BRCA1 or BRCA2 that have
been associated with some forms of breast and ovarian cancer. BRCAnalysis is one version of a number of tests that have been developed to
detect mutations at BRCA1 or 2. (For simplicity, I shall speak generically of BRCA testing to refer to all of the genetic tests designed to detect the many types of identified mutations at either BRCA1 or BRCA2
and I shall speak of those contemplating testing as women, although
men also carry the BRCA genes and those who do face elevated risk of
developing cancers and of passing on the genetic mutations to their children.) BRCA testing, and especially Myriads version of BRCAnalysis,
is particularly significant since it is one of the first genetic disposition
tests to reach the marketplace. As such, it is the forerunner of many
other genetic tests that will likely come on stream if the corporate profits and/or social benefits of this test prove encouraging. As research
programs pursuing further genetic tests proliferate, it is essential that
we pay careful attention to the question of what should be done with the
host of genetic secrets that will soon be revealed.
56
Although genetic testing has been around for some time, BRCA testing represents a major shift. Where earlier tests were primarily used on
fetuses (or on potential parents worried about the possibility of genetic
disease in future children), this test is targeted at adults regarding their
own future health status. As well, where some earlier tests did investigate future illness in adults, such as Huntingtons disease, they tended
to be limited to a small, identifiable group of people at risk; breast cancer, in contrast, threatens more than half the population. With a one in
nine incidence rate, breast cancer affects many Canadian families, and
popular media have ensured widespread awareness of the threat of the
disease. A genetic test associated with such a widely distributed and
highly feared disease is potentially of interest to a very large segment
of the population (even though the test is meaningful only for those
women who come from high-risk familiesthat is, less than 1 per cent
of women).1 Myriads decisions to aggressively market its version of
the BRCA test and to try to enforce its patent right internationally also
signify important changes to the ways in which genetic tests may be
affected by corporate agendas.
Because BRCAnalysis raises so many serious ethical questions that
will surely be compounded when it is joined by other genetic susceptibility tests, I propose to explore some of these questions as they relate
to the place of dispositional genetic tests within the complex array of
medical services that should be understood as meeting significant needs.
If we do determine that BRCA testing meets a medical need that should
be addressed within a public (or private, for that matter) health system, we must be prepared for the possible arrival of a host of additional
genetic tests for susceptibility to adult-onset diseases. Together, such
tests could easily swamp an already leaky health care system and generate enormous confusion among a population increasingly encouraged
to look for single causes and straightforward, technology-based solutions to complex, multi-factorial diseases. It is, therefore, urgent that
we seek to identify and resolve the complex question of whether or not
1 Those who might carry the BRCA mutation are thought to come from families with a history
of two or more closely related family members with the same or related cancers, a pattern of cancer
in two or more generations, and cancers diagnosed at an early age.
3.3. THE CASE FOR TREATING BRCA TESTING AS A NEED
57
to view such tests as meeting an important need before we go much

further down the path of developing additional genetic tests.
3.3 The Case for Treating BRCA Testing as a Need

Breast cancer is indeed a serious disease: all too often, it results in severe illness and death. At present, statistics indicate that one in nine
Canadian women will develop breast cancer over the course of their
livesa 13 per cent lifetime risk (www.cancer.ca). It is worth noting
that many of these cases involve older women (over 60); however, this
disease is no respecter of age. Young women also contract breast cancer:
it is the leading form of cancer affecting women under 45 (accounting
for 33 per cent of the cancers affecting this group) and the major cause
of death among women aged 15 to 40 (www.youngsurvival.org).
Moreover, it appears that when breast cancer does appear in young
women, it tends to be more aggressive and results in lower survival rates
than when it is first detected in older women (www.youngsurvival.org).
Although breast cancer is a threat to all women, it has long been
known that some women face especially high rates of developing breast
cancer. As Pat Kaufert (2003) observed, well before the development of
medical genetics, women who grew up in families with frequent cases
of breast cancer understood that they faced a high personal risk of developing the disease. In the early 1990s, researchers determined that
mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes were associated with some
forms of hereditary breast cancer or ovarian cancer. (It is estimated that
5 to 10 percent of women with breast cancer have a hereditary form,
and a significant proportion of these have been tied to an identifiable
BRCA mutation.) On the basis of knowledge about the role of BRCA
mutations, BRCAnalysis and other forms of BRCA tests have been developed to allow some women from families with high rates of these
cancers to determine whether they carried one of these genetic mutations, though tests do not yet exist for all apparently hereditary forms of
breast cancer. Women who discover that they carry a detectable BRCA
mutation will know that they face a lifetime risk of developing breast
cancer that is at least one in three and possibly much higher. They will
58
also learn that they have a 50 per cent chance of passing on this mutation to their children. And if they do develop breast or ovarian cancer,
they face a significant risk of dying an early and difficult death.
It is not hard to see, then, why women who come from families with
high rates of breast cancer might want to know their personal BRCA
status. Those who undergo testing face one of three possible outcomes:
a positive result indicating that they have the specific BRCA mutation
that has affected family members; a definitive negative result indicating
that they do not have the BRCA mutation found in their close relatives;
or an indeterminate result that could mean either they do not have a genetic risk of breast cancer or that there is no definitive test for the genetic
anomaly that affects them (Sutcliffe et al., 2001). If they are fortunate
enough to have a definitive negative result, they will likely be relieved
of an enormous emotional burden. They may feel freer to have children
of their own, and they may have an easier time getting employment,
health and life insurance, and perhaps even a spouse. Those who test
positive have available to them an option that could make a significant
difference to their life expectancy: if they decide to undergo prophylactic surgery to remove both breasts and both ovaries before any of
these organs becomes diseased they will be able to dramatically reduce
(though not eliminate) their likelihood of developing breast or ovarian
cancer (Eisen and Weber, 2001; Meijers-Heijboer et al., 2001). It is less
clear how those with indeterminate results will respond.
If we turn to Braybrookes account of needs, we can make a case for
the claim that access to BRCA testing should be classified as meeting a
course-of-life need and, therefore, that society is responsible to provide
for this option. Braybrookes account is explicitly social and situated.
He does not try to derive an exhaustive, timeless, universal set of human
needs that every society is responsible for meeting. Rather, he situates
needs within the context of a particular linguistic community and tries to
capture the sorts of things members of that community recognize some
obligation towards addressing. Hence, course-of-life needs are the sorts
of needs that members of an existing society (or linguistic community)
recognize as important to their pursuit of almost any project one might
choose in that society. They are the sorts of conditions necessary for
3.3. THE CASE FOR TREATING BRCA TESTING AS A NEED
59
living a life that members of that community recognize as characteristically human. In the most straightforward sense, this includes the ability
to continue to live and function normally. Thus,
Being essential to living or to functioning normally may be
taken as a criterion for being a basic need. Questions about
whether needs are genuine, or well-founded, come to the end
of the line when the needs have been connected with life or
health. (31; emphasis added)2
Since being connected to life or health generates a course-of-life
need, we can make the case that, at least for women from high-risk
families, BRCA testing satisfies such a need, since those who test positive may seek medical interventions that will dramatically reduce their
risk of contracting breast or ovarian cancer. In this way, we can connect
BRCA testing quite explicitly with the core intuition of course-of-life
needs.
Further, Braybrooke extends the notion of course-of-life needs beyond mere survival. Like many others, he recognizes that human beings
are essentially social creatures and we need to attend to the conditions
under which most people live and the contexts in which they satisfy their
needs. Human existence involves some core relationships that help to
structure our lives and shape the ways we seek to satisfy core needs.
Braybrooke identifies four basic social roles that he claims are sufficiently generic and central to the majority of adults in modern society
to be considered as constituting the sites for addressing course-of-life
needs: parent, householder, worker, and citizen (48).
Braybrooke reviews some of the many lists others have offered of
basic human needs and seeks areas of consensus. Rather than choose
any single account, or offer any particular definition (set out by a list of
necessary and sufficient conditions), he offers us a criterion for inclusion that captures the intuitions underlying the family of lists of human
2 He then goes on to offer a rather puzzling but intriguing comment in the context of a discussion of breast cancer. He claims, Indeed they may already have come to the end of the line [for
justifying something as a course-of-life need] when the needs have been connected with keeping
important parts of the body (31).
60
needs. The criterion, as he calls it, for a course-of-life need is being

indispensable to mind or body in performing the tasks assigned a given
person under a combination of basic social roles, namely the roles of
parent, householder, worker, and citizen (48). The criterion classifies
as needs the things necessary to allow people to function without derangement in the[se] tasks and roles (49). He believes it is a question
of fact whether or not something is a course-of-life need:
Something is a Matter of Need, by the Criterion, if there
are good grounds in causal evidence for presuming that any
member of the Reference Population would be unable to
carry out the tasks assigned her by one or more of the roles
mentioned if the matter in question were not provided for at
the Minimum Standard appropriate to that persons physique,
temperament, and circumstances. (49)
Arguably, women at high risk of having BRCA mutations may feel
that their ability to function responsibly in some core social roles, especially that of parent, may be facilitated by access to knowledge of
their BRCA status. This knowledge may influence their willingness to
bear children genetically related to them (since they have a 50 per cent
chance of passing on the mutation to their children) and their frankness
in discussing the subject with any children they do bear. And for those
fortunate women for whom the test provides a definitive negative result, such tests may also facilitate their ability to qualify for health and
life insurance and, thereby, for employment in so far as these things are
related (as they are in the United States).
It would seem, then, that according to Braybrookes account of
course-of-life needs the case can be made for establishing access to
BRCA testing for women who are at significant risk of carrying BRCA
mutations on two grounds: both for the contribution such knowledge
can make to their prospects for life and health and also for the ways such
knowledge may facilitate their ability to function in core social roles. If
we decide that this type of genetic test represents a course-of-life need,
then we have a social obligation to ensure that our policies reflect its
importance. That means we should try to provide the means for satisfy-
3.4. SOME COMPLICATING FEATURES OF BRCA TESTING
61
ing this need for all who are likely to benefit significantly from the test.
Similar arguments would have to be considered for any other genetic
susceptibility test that is developed.
Let us turn now to some of the complexities of BRCA testing and
explore reasons (beyond the potentially high financial costs) why we
might want to resist the implication that such tests be seen as falling in
the category of a course-of-life need.
3.4
Some Complicating Features of BRCA Testing
The case in favour of treating access to BRCA testing as a course-oflife need was based on the potential of allowing women who know their
BRCA status to take steps to reduce their risks of contracting breast cancer if they test positive or more confidently pursuing some of their core
social roles if they do not. The situation is complicated, however, as so
many things in medicine are, by the fact that there is plenty of uncertainty attached to the actual impact of a BRCA mutation in a particular
womans life. Women who undergo testing must come to grips with the
fact that they may receive misleading information. Like other medical
tests, BRCA tests are vulnerable to the possibility of inaccuracy: they
may provide false positives or false negatives. In this case, the costs
of the test, the rush to market, and the significant emotional burden attached to such testing have created a situation in which there has not
been enough experience with the test or enough research to indicate the
precise degree of accuracy of the various BRCA tests (Kaufert, 2003).
Moreover, they face the daunting task of making sense of the probabilistic information that derives from identifying such a mutation. Unlike purely predictive tests for single-gene disorders such as Huntingtons disease, there is no perfect correlation between breast cancer and
BRCA mutations. Even women who test definitively negative are not
assured that they will not develop breast cancer, only that they will not
face a higher rate of risk than other Canadian women (that is, a normal
rate of one in nine, or perhaps one in ten when we remove statistics of
women carrying BRCA mutations).3 Breast cancer is multifactorial,
3 From
a medical perspective, the absence of a BRCA mutation does not confer the absence
62
and genetic mutations are just a small part of the causal story (less than
10 per cent), though it is a very important part for the minority of women
with family histories of BRCA mutations.
For those who test positive, there is no way of determining their
personal level of risk because gene penetrance (that is, the percentage of
individuals affected who will go on to develop the disease) varies widely
with particular mutations (ranging from 36 to 85 per cent) in ways that
are not easily predicted. For nearly all of the thousands of variations of
BRCA1 or 2 mutations, it is impossible to make accurate predictions of
personal cancer risk.4 In addition to the mysteries of penetrance, there is
the further complexity that these numbers speak of lifetime risk; there
is a set of probabilities to interpret to estimate whether the particular
genetic variation will affect particular women in their youth, middle, or
old age.5
Adding to the difficulties of determining the value of BRCA testing is the fact that there is no particularly satisfactory response available in the face of a positive test. The options are primarily those of
surveillance, chemoprevention, or surgery. Surveillance can be pursued
through breast self-examination (BSE) along with frequent mammograms. Besides the fact that neither technique actually prevents breast
cancer, both face other obstacles: BSE has been shown to be not particularly effective as an early detection strategy and there are risks attached
to performing frequent mammograms on young women, especially in
light of the fact that there is speculation that BRCA-associated breast
cancer may be radiosensitive. Chemoprevention - that is, taking tomoxifen or other powerful drugsis unproven with BRCA-associated
breast cancer and carries high risks of iatrogenic illnesses (current data
of risk. If a person tests negative, it could be because the mutation is not present, but it could also
be because the person has a mutation that cannot be detected by current technology or because
there is a mutation in another gene not yet identified. So negative BRCA tests are meaningful only
when the specific BRCA mutation has been identified for a high-risk family. Hence, most negative
tests are considered indeterminate and the person is still considered at risk because of the family
history (Sutcliffe, 2001).
4 In fact, penetrance levels are so uneven with BRCA mutations that the NIH warns that The
penetrance of BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations has yet to be determined for other than mutations
commonly found in Ashkenazi Jews or Icelanders. www.cancer.gov/cancerinfo.
5 Statistically, however, women with BRCA1/2 mutations develop breast cancer at an earlier
age than other women.
3.4. SOME COMPLICATING FEATURES OF BRCA TESTING
63
suggest it is of no benefit to women with BRCA1 mutations, though it

may be helpful to women with BRCA2 mutations) (King et al., 2001).
The most effective preventative strategy is surgical intervention, requiring bilateral prophylactic mastectomy as well as removal of the ovaries;
needless to say, this is a drastic intervention with serious physical and
psychological repercussions. Moreover, even this major intervention
does not provide complete protection against breast cancer.
Women who receive testing face further difficulties in deciding what
to do with the results, especially if they are positive or ambiguous. With
whom should they share the information and from whom should they
withhold it? What should they tell their daughters (and sons) and when?
There are no long-term studies evaluating the medical and psychological impact of test results or of the various interventions that follow
positive (and negative) test results, though existing data do indicate that
women who undergo testing are affected more deeply than they anticipated (Bish et al., 2002; Dorval et al., 2000).
The data that do exist are disturbing. Consider the fact that the most
effective preventative option available to those with BRCA mutations is
radical surgery. A 1997 study in the New England Journal of Medicine
reports that, on average, 30-year-old women who carry BRCA1 or
BRCA2 mutations gain from 2.9 to 5.3 years of life expectancy from
prophylactic mastectomy and from 0.3 to 1.7 years of life expectancy
from prophylactic oophorectomy (Schrag et al., 1997).6 While experts
consider this a good outcome, many women clearly expect more from
the decision to undergo radical surgery. One study found that at-risk
women showed a 70 per cent time-tradeoff value, indicating that the
women were willing to sacrifice 30 per cent of life expectancy in order
to avoid prophylactic mastectomy (Unic et al., 1998) This may explain
why a 1995 study found that as few as 10 per cent of women at high
6 Another study found that for a 30-year-old woman, according to her cancer risks, prophylactic oophorectomy improved survival by 0.4 to 2.6 years; mastectomy, by 2.8 to 3.4 years; and
mastectomy and oophorectomy, by 3.3 to 6.0 years over surveillance. The QALYs saved were 0.5
for oophorectomy and 1.9 for the combined procedures in the high-risk model. Prophylactic surgeries were cost-effective compared with surveillance for years of life saved, but not for QALYs.
CONCLUSION: Among women who test positive for a BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene mutation, prophylactic surgery at a young age substantially improves survival, but unless genetic risk of cancer
is high, provides no benefit for quality of life (Grann et al., 1998)
64
risk of developing breast cancer choose prophylactic mastectomy (Stefanek et al., 1995). It is worth noting, however, that more recent studies
that take into account our ability to identify many BRCA1 and BRCA2
mutations are giving a different picture. For example, 2001 studies that
specifically address the effectiveness of prophylactic surgery for those
with identified BRCA1/2 mutations indicate there is definite benefit attached to undergoing surgery; unfortunately, these studies are limited to
a three-year follow-up period but most women seek longer-term information (Meijers-Heijboer et al., 2001; Eisen and Weber, 2001).
So, here we have a technology that is promoted as serving the function of a course-of-life need, yet we find many women uncertain whether
to even avail themselves of the test. In fact, Myriad Genetics, the company that patented the BRCAnalysis test, has been surprised to find that
women have not been demanding testing in the large numbers anticipated despite an active direct-to-consumer advertising campaign. If so
many of the women who might be BRCA-positive are resisting the test,
should it really be classified as a course-of-life need? It is worth noting
here that Braybrooke does not require that every person avail themselves
of all of the opportunities classified as matters of need, even course-oflife need; there are often good reasons why individuals choose not to
claim something that falls under the category of need. So the fact that
many women who are at particular risk of BRCA mutations choose not
to undergo testing is not necessarily proof that genetic testing should
not be classified as a course-of-life need. It should, however, give us
pause: the ambiguity in determining the specific harms and benefits of
testing for particular women make it difficult to situate BRCA testing in
the realm of course-of-life needs.7
7 Perhaps, in light of the uncertainty of outcome and the weighty combination of benefits and
burdens attached to testing, we should, for the present at least, treat such tests as responding to
adventitious needs, according to how they fit within particular womens values and life plans.
Adventitious needs are captured by a relational formula of the form: x needs y in order to do z;
that is, they are relative to the particular ends an agent has adopted, and, as a result, they function
largely like preferences. The urgency of an agents need for y to accomplish z depends on the
importance of z to that agent. Given the wide variety in goals individuals set for themselves, and
the wide variety of responses to those goals adopted by their fellow citizens, Braybrooke quite
wisely avoids recommending making satisfaction of the large range of adventitious needs a moral
requirement of social policy.
3.5. TOWARDS A RELATIONAL UNDERSTANDING OF NEEDS
65
3.5 Towards a Relational Understanding of N eeds

We can find helpful direction in Braybrookes account as to how to organize our social policy under these sorts of conditions of uncertainty and
anxietythat is, are Canadian provinces and territories morally obligated to provide genetic testing and related medical services for BRCA
and similar anomalies under the claim that such services are medically
necessary? Braybrooke makes clear that we cannot restrict core needs
to those required for bare survival; many important course-of-life needs
are intimately connected to the societies in which they occur. As noted
above, he argues that we must make room for meeting needs that arise
in the context of playing core social roles. In other words, some needs,
even course-of-life needs, are inherently relational in that they arise in
the context of pursuing relationships with others.
I must disagree with him, however, on the proposal that we can limit
the relevant roles and relationships to the basic set of parent, householder, worker, and citizen. I do not believe that we can capture all the
morally significant social dimensions of human life within this small
set of social roles. For one thing, this list refers only to roles held by
responsible adults and thereby privileges the socially generated needs
of this group while ignoring many other aspects of a richly textured relational life. Further, his account treats these generic roles as if they applied comparably to all social groups without attention to gender, race,
class, or other important dimensions of the lives of persons. I propose,
therefore, to build on the leadership Braybrooke has provided by tying
course-of-life needs to social roles and also to expand on his conception
of relational significance.
In my own work, I seek to make clear the importance for policymaking of replacing the reigning liberal conceptions of persons as rational,
independent beings with an understanding of persons as thoroughly relational beings (Sherwin, 2003). While Braybrooke offers us a significantly more socially complex moral subject than most liberal theorists,
he still thinks, ultimately, that our unit of analysis should be understood
as generic persons with common characteristics. I believe that this picture needs feminist re-visioningsupplanting his partially relational
66
conception of persons with a fully relational account.

The relational conception of persons that emerges from feminist
theory portrays a subject who is (at least partially) constituted by social interactions. Rather than understanding persons as ontologically
prior to society, a relational account envisions persons as beings who
are createdin large partthrough their social relations.8 Although
Braybrooke distances himself from the traditional liberal view of persons as transparent, rational deliberators with well-ordered preferences,
he promotes in its stead a view of persons as the locus for a set of
needs and personal projects, many of which can be discussed abstractly
in generic terms. Where traditional liberal theorists encourage us to
respect the existing values of individuals, Braybrooke assigns such individual variation to the sphere of adventitious needs (or preferences)
and assigns priority to common course-of-life needs (though even here
there is room for preferences in how those basic needs are satisfied).
Like other liberal theorists, however, he seems to assume that personal
values are either apparent or readily discovered by the individual who
holds them through a process of introspection. In contrast, relational
theorists believe it significant that most people come to develop many
of their values in the social process of dialogue and action. In other
words, personal values are formed through social engagement, not prior
to such interaction. For this reason, it is essential that we pay attention to the circumstances in which these values are forged. If injustice
structures the conditions under which they are generated, then policies
that simply respond to those values are likely to at least perpetuate, and
perhaps even exacerbate, the original injustice.
Needs, like values, emerge from particular social circumstances. Although some needs deal with basic animal survival, the effectiveness of
a societys infrastructure may determine whether or not these crucial
needs even become visible (for example, the need for non-toxic air and
water). Further, Braybrooke rightly recognizes that the social needs that
are attached to core social roles must be seen as developing in partic8 As Annette Baier (1985) explained, persons are always second persons, created through
social processes; we become persons through learning from other persons how to be persons ourselves.
3.5. TOWARDS A RELATIONAL UNDERSTANDING OF NEEDS
67
ular social contexts. In addition, he notes that some needs are derived
from scientific discoveries that support practices capable of sustaining
course-of-life needs; medical care seems clearly to fall under this category (83). It is important, then, that we examine the contexts of scientific discovery that generate specific course-of-life needs if we are to
resolve the difficult sorts of questions associated with determining medical needs. For example, in the case at hand, it is worth reflecting on the
processes that have led us to the current levels of genetic knowledge and
those that have led us away from other types of approaches to breast cancer and other diseases (as well as those that generate technology-laden
services to extend life for the critically ill and ignore such factors as the
value of literacy in increasing life expectancy).
There are additional insights feminists can build on within Braybrookes theory. He offers explicit recognition that persons are essentially embodied beings. Feminist relational accounts add to this insight
the fact that many of the bodily characteristics of persons carry important social meanings. Within contemporary Western society, social and
political significance is attached to such features as sex, race, disability,
sexuality, and age. These features are the basis of social groups that
exist in relations of oppression or dominance with other social groups,
and a persons classification within the complex array of social groups
will affect her or his life experiences. In other words, relational persons are inseparable from their particular historical, social, and political
circumstances; they cannot be properly understood in abstraction from
these contexts.
If we accept the need to understand personsthe focus of liberal
concernas relational rather than self-contained beings, then we must
modify the ways we understand our principal moral and political obligations to them. In particular, we need to revise the ways in which we
understand the traditional liberal concerns of autonomy and justice in
order to reflect the fact that persons are now conceived of as a different
type of entity. ( Feminism, in my view, does not require us to abandon
commitment to the core liberal values of autonomy and justice, but it
does demand significant reinterpretation of each concept.) Because social group membership is a principal component of feminist relational
68
accounts of personhood, efforts to promote autonomy and justice must

consider ways in which these values should be addressed at the level of
social groups as well as at the more familiar level of individuals.
In particular, we must make explicit the fact that autonomy is both
defined and pursued in social contexts. This requires us to reflect on
ways in which increased options may sometimes limit real autonomy.
For example, feminist researchers have explored ways in which the very
availability and normalization of prenatal testing of fetuses, while apparently expanding the control women have over their pregnancies, have
the effect of making many women feel compelled to participate in such
testing even though it distorts their experience of pregnancy and does
not fit well with their deepest values regarding acceptance of children
with disabilities (Rothman, 1986; Sherwin, 2001). On traditional views,
autonomy is achieved if the women concerned have full information and
are free from explicit compulsion; relational interpretations make visible ways in which social practices of normalizing prenatal testing make
refusal of such services very difficult for many women.
Hence, where liberal individualist theories either look at the generic
conditions required for any individual to exercise autonomy (in political theory) or focus on the quality of decision-making by individuals
as they are presently constituted (in practical ethics), feminist relational
accounts explore the social conditions that supportor inhibiteach
persons ability to identify and pursue her own concerns. Feminist accounts are particularly sensitive to the ways in which oppressive structures limit the types of choices available to members of particular social
groups. Feminists are also concerned with the fact that social conditions may affect an individuals very ability to exercise autonomy in that
some people who face significant oppression may have fewer opportunities than others to develop the skills necessary to exercise autonomy
(Meyers, 1989). Oppressive conditions may interfere with the opportunities people have for developing skills necessary for exercising
autonomy generally or in particular types of circumstances.
Similarly, f eminist relational accounts of social justice look beyond
considerations of fair distributions of benefits and burdens to consider
how various policy options will affect existing patterns of oppression
3.6. BRCA TESTING REVISITED
69
or privilege. They consider not only what share of societys limited

resources an individual can justly lay claim to (the underlying goal of
Braybrookes account of needs) but also how patterns of social organization may construct needs and roles differently for particular social
groups and how these differences might affect recognition of, and response to, claims of need. The Canada Health Act promises equal access to medical and hospital-based treatments, but it does nothing to
provide for equal access to appropriate levels of the various social and
economic conditions (such as housing, employment, and education) that
affect an individuals health status and need for medical treatment. To
treat all individuals with comparable medical course-of-life needs as
making equivalent demands on the health care system is to treat their
current situations as if they arose from a level playing field. A feminist
relational understanding of social justice would have us look beyond
efforts to fairly meet current needs and also examine the social conditions that generate those needs. It would also direct us to ensure that the
practices and policies that address current needs do not unjustly worsen
the condition of members of disadvantaged social groups, lest we create
future distortions in justice.
3.6 BRCA Testing Revisited

I am finally ready to return to some of the moral complexities attached to
the availability of BRCA testing with respect to the question of whether
genetic susceptibility testing should be classified as a medical ( courseof-life) need and treated accordingly by public policy. My claim is that
revising Braybrookes proposal of socially situated course-of-life needs
in accordance with feminist relational theory can help us decide how to
respond to the sorts of demands genetic dispositional testing is beginning to generate within a system committed to meeting medical needs.
The traditional liberal conception of personhood would have us construct this problem as one of individual preferences and focus on the
moral principle of respect for patient autonomy. Indeed, this is the way
that genetic susceptibility testing is being promoted: as a matter for individual choice in a context of thorough, reliable information. (In Canada,
70
BRCA testing is provided in settings where trained genetic counsellors are available.) Braybrookes approach is a significant improvement
since it urges us to develop an understanding of course-of-life needs
that would take precedence over matters of individual preference and
choice; hence, it allows us to see that not all decisions can be reduced
to matters of consumer choice. Unlike adventitious needs that are a
form of preferences, course-of-life needs are meant to capture something more urgent than the things individuals happen to choose.
From what we now know of BRCA testing, it seems plausible to regard it as a course-of-life need for the small minority of women whose
family history suggests there is a high likelihood they are at risk of carrying an identifiable BRCA mutation (less than 10 per cent of the 13
per cent of women who will contract breast cancer in their lifetimes).
This means that those women who meet strict eligibility criteria, based
on scientific evaluation that they are at high risk of having such a mutation, should be granted access to the test (should they so choose) and
any follow-up therapy they decide upon in consultation with medical
experts. Other womenthat is, the vast majority, including many with
breast cancer in their familieshave such a low likelihood of carrying
an identifiable BRCA mutation, however, that testing should not be seen
as a course-of-life need. Nor should it be described as an adventitious
need, to be available upon informed request. Rather, it should be seen
as not meeting any need at all.9
A relational understanding of personhood, autonomy, and justice
helps us to understand why it is not acceptable to allow individuals who
do not meet scientific eligibility requirements for testing to exercise personal choice in seeking out such tests. Relational theory directs us to
pay close attention to the prevailing climate in which women are asked
to make these difficult decisions. It is a climate in which all women,
especially those considered vulnerable to hereditary breast cancer, are
regularly warned about the threat of breast cancer and advised to pursue
every avenue that might reduce their personal risk no matter the actual
impact of specific measures in their circumstances. In the current con9 In fact, this has been the way BRCA testing has been handled in Canada to date. It is
available only to women who meet strict scientific eligibility requirements.
71
text of heightened fear, inadequate information, poor understanding of

the meaning of available statistical data, and the manipulating effects
of marketing, it is problematic to speak blithely of voluntary informed
choice. Many of these factors actively undermine the ability of women
to engage in voluntary, rational deliberationthe basic requirements of
patient autonomy. Moreover, these conditions are not ones that can be
fully ameliorated by good genetic counselling, since genetic counsellors cannot themselves alter the background social conditions that may
be distorting understanding.
We need to reflect on how these background social conditions have
evolved and how BRCA testing itself fits into a particular, problematic
model of medical care. Breast cancer is a highly visible and emotionally
charged disease. It has become emblematic of concerns about womens
health to the point of eclipsing attention to many other conditions that
threaten women. Public awareness of the availability of BRCA tests
contributes to the publics perception of the pervasiveness of the threat
of breast cancer and also to the priority given to individual strategies
for breast cancer avoidance in a competitive health research and health
services environment.
Moreover, as BRCA tests are joined by other genetic susceptibility tests, the growing array of genetic tests is likely to feed increasing
public sentiment that most health risks reside in our genes - a tendency
that Abby Lippman (1991) has dubbed geneticization, whereby complex phenomena are reduced to simple expressions of single genes. This
attitude works in conjunction with the complementary perception of genetic determinism (that is, the view that genes determine experience)
to foster public beliefs that improvements in health will flow directly
from increased genetic knowledge. Lost from these ways of viewing
the world is the understanding that genes operate within particular environments and that genetic tendencies result in specific outcomes only
in the presence of additional causal factors. Already, the search for genetic susceptibilities is obscuring the need and undermining support for
research into other conditions which contribute to particular diseases,
including breast cancer. When BRCA testing is joined by an array of
susceptibility tests for other diseases that many adults fear (heart dis-
72
ease, Alzheimers, diabetes), popular understanding is likely to shift

even further in the direction of geneticization and genetic determinism
and away from other types of programs that can reduce the incidence of
many forms of disease.
If BRCA and other genetic susceptibility tests are judged to be
course-of-life needs for growing segments of the population, then as the
number of tests proliferates, we must ensure that the resources needed
to deliver the tests in a responsible manner are available to potential
users. This will require a significant social investment in training many
more professional genetic counsellors. Provincial health plans will need
to set criteria that determine what genetic tests will be covered by public insurance and with what degree of support. And, clearly, they will
have a moral obligation to ensure that those who receive positive (and
perhaps also indeterminate) test results will receive the therapy (both
medical and psychological) deemed appropriate by patients and their
physicians. Those engaged in setting health research priorities must encourage long-term studies to fill in the current knowledge gaps about
outcome measures for various responses to BRCA test results, and similar studies will be required for other types of genetic tests.
Before we get too caught up in building the infrastructure for widespread genetic testing, then, we need to recognize that decisions (or
non-decisions) about proliferation of such tests made at the policy level
have profound implications for patients and providers in all their deliberations. Because breast cancer, like most diseases, is multifactorial,
it is essential that we not lose track of other course-of-life needs attached to this and other diseases. This will require policies that provide
research and treatment resources that correspond to the various factors
that contribute to each disease, perhaps in rough proportion to the degree of involvement of each. Hence, we must not trade an enthusiasm
for genetic information for recognition of the enormous significance of
environmental and socioeconomic factors in the incidence and severity
of disease.
Yet, as scientific understanding of the role of genetic mutations increases, those who set health research priorities seem to be losing sight
of the well-established fact that most illness and suffering result from
73
conditions that can be ameliorated by social and political actions. For

example, there is growing evidence that we can probably prevent far
more cases of breast cancer by identifying and altering the environmental factors that lead those who are susceptible for genetic and other
reasons to develop breast cancer than we can through BRCA testing
and radical surgical preventions (Chernomas and Donner, 2004). Looking beyond the impact of breast cancer, we see overwhelming evidence
that reducing the economic, social, and political inequalities that plague
members of disadvantaged social groupsfor example, aboriginals, immigrants, and people who are homelesswill have a major effect on
their health and life expectancy. Our collective moral responsibilities
require that health research and health services policies not be deterred
from these important dimensions.
It is significant that the move to geneticization and overinvestment
in genetic strategies occurs as individual patients, researchers, and medical specialists pursue paths that make good sense from their particular
social locations, each acting responsibly in the context of their own interests and expertise. Given the choice, as individuals we are each likely
to pursue any option that offers to reduce the risk of contracting diseases that frighten us, and researchers and medical caregivers will feel
the pressure to provide these options. Thus, these social effects cannot
be avoided by insisting on more responsible decision-making by individual players. Nor will they be resolved by more complete consumer
information. We must, therefore, address the problem at the level of
social policies, not individual autonomy. Otherwise, geneticization will
continue to threaten efforts to address other, important course-of-life
needs. Justice demands that we focus our health policies on strategies
that will contribute most effectively to the health of the whole population, especially the health needs of the most disadvantaged. Indeed, it is
the fact that these two approachesindividual and collective pursuit of
health protection strategiesdo not always come to the same conclusions that makes it urgent that we continue with Braybrookes project of
trying to develop an understanding of needs that can justly guide social
policy, lest we end up trying to respond to whatever individual preferences happen to present themselves.
74
It may appear, however, that we are now even deeper into the bottomless pit of medical needs for expensive life-prolonging therapies
that caused Braybrooke to despair of a solution within his systematic
account of needs. I believe we have made some progress, though. First,
it should now be clear that we can deploy Braybrookes conception of
course-of-life needs to legitimately limit access to genetic susceptibility tests to those for whom the proposed test is indeed likely to meet
a course-of-life need: that is, to those at significant risk of carrying an
identifiable mutation for a life-threatening disease with a potential lifesaving therapy available. We can, in good conscience, deny it to others
who may very much want to know their BRCA status: they have no
need for such testing.
Second, it now seems clear that we should not concentrate solely on
determining whether or not to treat BRCA and future genetic susceptibility tests as meeting course-of-life needs for some individuals; we
should also reflect on how we have arrived at this difficult decision. In
other words, we need to think about how our health care system has
evolved and where it is heading. We cannot make satisfactory progress
in determining how to categorize individual types of medical technology on a case-by-case basis alone, even if the technologies in question
do promise to save or prolong lives. Instead, we need to reflect on how,
collectively, we ought to approach matters of life and health throughout
our social policies.
Such reflections make clear that we are obligated to ensure that the
scientific projects our society funds and the delivery systems it devises
reflect the general health needs of the population. Our goal should be
to foster those policies most conducive to protecting and promoting the
lives of all citizens. Social justice requires us to work particularly hard
at addressing the health needs of those members of society whose health
is seriously harmed by pervasive patterns of injustice in society. Hence,
we cannot wait to respond to the demands of frightened individuals who
seek access to technologies that private corporations have determined to
be profitably marketable. In fact, we should make clear from the start
that we will not allow our health system to respond to requests for tests
that meet, at best, adventitious needs in a consumer-driven climate. Our
75
support for genetic susceptibility testing should be limited to those tests

that can be shown to meet course-of-life needs for a defined segment
of the population. Moreover, we need to take steps to ensure that the
health interventions that are being developed are the ones that will best
promote health in our society.
Braybrooke is correct that health and life are core course-of-life
needs. We must be very careful, however, not to read him as directing
us down the dangerous path of trying to determine, technology by technology, what medical innovations will be classified as meeting courseof-life needs. These decisions are best made in terms of overall social
policy objectives that keep social justice and relational autonomy considerations squarely in view.
Chapter 4
The Mutual Limitation of Needs as

Bases of Moral Entitlements: A
Solution to Braybrookes Problem
D UNCAN M AC I NTOSH
Abstract
David Braybrooke argues that meeting peoples needs ought to be the
primary goal of social policy. But he then faces the problem of how to
deal with the fact that our most pressing needs, needs to be kept alive
with resource-draining medical technology, threaten to exhaust our resources for meeting all other needs. I consider several solutions to this
problem, eventually suggesting that the need to be kept alive is no different in kind from needs to fulfill various projects, and that needs may
have a structure similar to rights, with peoples legitimate needs serving
as constraints on each others entitlements to resources. This affords
a set of axioms constraining possible needs. Further, if, as Braybrooke
thinks, needs are created by communities approving projects, so that the
means to prosecute the projects then come to count as needs, then communities are obliged to approve only projects that are co-feasible given
the worlds finite resources. The result is that it can be legitimate not to
funnel resources towards endless life-prolongation projects.
My thanks to Heidi Tiedke, Susan Sherwin, and Richmond Campbell for helpful discussion.
My thanks also to Sherwin and to Peter Schotch for their editorial work on this volume, and, of
course, to David Braybrooke, for the stimulation of his ideas and for the example of philosophical
collegiality which he has constituted in the philosophy department at Dalhousie University.
77
CHAPTER 4. DUNCAN MACINTOSH
78
4.1
Introduction
In his book Meeting Needs(1987), David Braybrooke argues that meeting peoples needs ought to be the primary goal of social policy. He
distinguishes two types of needs. First, there are course-of-life needs.
These are needs which everyone has and which must be satisfied for
people to function normally in society when performing any of the roles
of which the society approves and advancing any of the projects it permits people to choose. Second, there are adventitious needs, ones varying from project to project, and which must be satisfied in order for
people to advance the specific projects for which they have individual
preferences. Social policy should be organized to try to satisfy needs in
their order of importancecourse-of-life needs first, adventitious needs
second.
In this paper I moot several possible solutions to a problem that worries Braybrooke. The problem is that using costly, resource-intensive
medical technology to meet the basic needs people have to be kept alive
at what would otherwise be the end of their lives will consume all the
resources available for meeting needs in general. If grounding entitlements in needs is correct, we must find within the concept of needs a
way to limit this crisis in a morally acceptable way. Many of the solutions I shall consider have difficulties, but discussing them will refine
the problem and point the way to a workable solution.
4.2
The Appeal of Needs as the Basis of Moral

Entitlements to Resources
It is attractive to see needs as the basis of moral entitlements. It seems

more plausible, for example, to see it as entitling someone to something
that they need it, rather than just that they want it, or would be made
happy by it. That they have a right to it might seem an even better argument. But what grounds the right? Again, it is plausible to say that
a person has a right to something in proportion to her need for it. This
seems more acceptable than saying that her right owes to her having
found the thing, or her having claimed it, invented it, contracted for it,
4.2. THE APPEAL OF NEEDS
79
or having mixed her labour with it. For these latter pretexts presuppose
principles of justice in the acquisition of goods characteristic of institutions of private property, institutions themselves needing grounding;
and, arguably, they are defensible only if their existence results in peoples needs being met. True, such institutions have been defended by
Nozick as being required in order to afford everyone unfettered liberty
(Nozick, 1974). But on reflection, surely there are things more important than that kind of freedom, specifically, the meeting of peoples basic, undeniable needs. There seems, then, to be something foundational
and irrefutable about someones having a title to something on the basis
of needing it.
Taking entitlement to ground in needs has the further advantage
that the question of whether someone has a need seems to be empirical,
something that can be ascertained by investigation, and on which there
could be a consensus compelled by the non-moral facts. Thus it would
make entitlement objective. And this would mean that, in one stroke,
we had answered three questions of meta-ethics:
1. Question: how can morality be factual? Answer: the question,
what, morally, ought to be done, reduces to the question, who
needs what, and so who should be given what?
2. Question: how can we infer from statements about what is (true)
to statements about what ought to be (true)? Answer: by the
mediation of needs: if it is true that someone needs x, it ought to
be made true that they are given x.
3. Question: how can apprehending moral facts be reason-giving in
the sense of motivating? Answer: our moral duties are to meet
needs, and seeing that someone needs something tends to incline
one to procure it for them.1
Taking needs as the basis of moral entitlements also provides a basis
for forming policy on how to distribute resources among people, for
we could then compute which policies are correct from knowledge of
1 For
more on this constellation of issues, see Richmond Campbells essay in this volume.
80
peoples needs in a needs calculus, much as was hoped by utilitarians

for the felicific calculus.
4.3
Braybrookes Problem
Unfortunately, there are at least two problems for this view, problems
deriving from the possibility of two kinds of needs monster, on analogy with the notion of a utility monster. Utilitarians hold that a world
is morally better the more happiness there is in it. There are at least
three versions of utilitarianism. On one, what matters morally is how
much happiness there is in the world, not how many people share in that
happiness. But on this version, if there were a creature who, by being
given all of the worlds resources, would be made more happy than the
sum total of everyone elses happiness on any other distribution of resources, that being should get all the resources; and this seems unjust.
(This creature is hyper-efficient at converting resources accorded to it
into its own happiness, and therefore hyper-appetitive for resources.)
Suppose we say instead that a world is better the more happiness
there is in it, provided everyone is made equally happy in that world
total quantity of happiness is not all that matters; it matters too how the
happiness is distributed. But then there could be another kind of utility monster, a creature so ineffective at converting resources accorded
to it into its own happiness that, even distributing most of the worlds
resources to it at our expense, so that the rest of us have only enough
resources to live lives just barely above being miserable, this creatures
life will still just barely be above being miserable. (If the first creature is
the efficient utility monster, the second is the inefficient utility monster,
and it too is hyper-appetitive of resources.)
This suggests a third kind of utilitarianism, one in which both the
total amount of happiness and its distribution matter, but the distribution
required is not perfect equality. Instead, if vastly more people could be
made vastly happier by not trying to make the inefficient utility monster
happy, then that is how resources should be distributed. Equality matters, but only to a degree; it can be outweighed by other considerations
using some discounting factor. People do not have an absolute right
4.3. BRAYBROOKES PROBLEM
81
to participate equally in the total amount of happiness, only a weighted

right. Their being equal participants is only allowed to weigh down to a
certain degree the total amount of happiness. The degree, of course, is
problematic to formulate or justify.
At any rate, until recently, the existence of such monsters was a
largely abstract problem: most of us are in fact pretty similar in our
appetites for resources and in our efficiency at converting resources into
our own happiness. True, relative to me (a non-disabled person), a disabled person is in some degree an inefficient utility monster; and relative
to a disabled person, I am in some degree an efficient utility monster.2
But the resource cost to the rest of us for helping the disabled is relatively small. For many of the disabled are fairly easily helped, so
helping them is cheap (we put in wheelchair ramps and so on), while
the remainder are fantastically hard to help (they have irreparable spinal
cord damage, say), so hard that there is almost nothing we can do (except give them nursing care, say), and so, even doing what we can, it
is cheap to help. So barring a massive increase in the number of disabled people, or in the severity of their disabilities, or in the availability
of hugely costly means of helping them, redistributions of resources
to accommodate the disabled will probably not overly drain the total
resources available.
But medical technology is getting to the point where, with great cost
in resources, it is possible to extend individual lives ; and the longer
lives are to be extended, the more resource-costly it is to do the extending. Already the lives of some persons are being extended at great
cost in resources, the cost growing as technologies become available for
ever-increasing prolongation. (Think of the epidemic of diabetes and the
cost of the dialysis sometimes needed to treat those in diabetes-induced,
end-stage renal failurehundreds of thousands of dollars per year per
patient.) And if ever more resources are devoted to producing these
technologies in order to extend peoples lives, ever fewer resources will
2 I am assuming for the sake of argument that, on average, it would take more resources to
provide a disabled person with a given amount of happiness than would be required for a nondisabled person; for I am assuming that extra resources would be required to mitigate the effects
of their disabilities. But in a given actual case, this assumption could be false: notoriously, how
happy people are can be quite independent of whether or not they have perceived disabilities.
82
be available to support the activities that make peoples lives worth living. Pretty soon, we will all be inefficient utility monsters. We will all
be said to require for our happiness more and more of the ever-moreavailable but ever-more-costly technologies needed to prolong our lives.
The analogous problem for a needs-based morality is obvious, and it
is a problem Braybrooke admits he is unsure how to solve (Braybrooke
(1987a) chap. 8): if people need anything, they need the prerequisites
for being alive; and as our bodies inevitably age, we will all come to a
point where only longevity-prolonging technology can keep us alive
we will all need this technology. But not all of us can have it, or at
least not without other people, at some point in their lives, not getting
the resources to have a decent life. Meeting peoples needs for lifesustaining technologies can only be met at the cost of not meeting many
other needs. Perhaps these other needs are less important. And yet they
are needs which, if they go unmet, make it dubious whether life is much
worth living.
On the face of it, Braybrookes problem is not solvable. Surely
needs should be met in the order of their importance; and surely it is
more important to meet someone elses need to be kept alive (assuming
they will have some minimally decent quality of life) than to meet my
need to have a life more than minimally decent in quality. It then seems
morally obligatory to distribute resources in such a way that as many
people as possible are kept alive as long as possible, even if this is to be
at the expense of the overall quality of peoples lives.
Indeed, the problem seems even more pressing for needs-based
ethics than for utilitarianism, or at least the third form of utilitarianism. For the utilitarian can say that all extending a persons life by a
day does is increase one persons happiness by one day; and if there is a
more efficient way to increase more peoples happiness, then since the
total level of happiness would be higher that way than by using otherwise deployable resources in heroic medical efforts for one person, that
is how they should be used. But it seems that, on needs-based ethics,
the need a person has to be alive trumps all other non-life-and-death
needs of any and all other persons.
4.4. POSSIBLE SOLUTIONS TO BRAYBROOKES PROBLEM
83
4.4 Possible Solutions to Braybrookes Problem

Braybrookes problem in a nutshell is this: given that our social and
institutional priorities should be meeting peoples needs, in their order
of priority, how is this not to oblige us to live lives of drudgery supporting the longevity of ourselves and others? There seem to me to be
several possible solutions. I now consider them in order of increasing
conceptual ambitiousness.
4.4.1
Questioning the Empirical Assumptions of the Problem
One solution is to claim that the problem makes empirically false assumptions. Maybe it will not prove all that expensive to extend lives;
maybe this can be done without much sacrifice in the meeting of other
needs, and in the meeting of the needs of other people who do not yet
require medical technology to live. For one thing, extended lives may
wind up being extended in productivity as well, so that, as the need
for life-extension technology expands, so will those resources constituted of a robust workforce. And so we will have resources to meet
these needs: people with longer lives will be able to work to pay for
ever-longer lives.
It may also be possible to innovate not just in inventing life-sustaining
technologies, but also in their resource costmaybe they are likely to
become cheaper and more efficient, especially as they are pursued in an
ever-expanding market.
Further, maybe meeting some peoples prolongation needs will result in others needs being metthe person whose life we save can now
continue in the workforce; and with her productivity there, she can contribute not only to maintaining her own life, but to meeting the needs
of other people, and to meeting needs of other sorts than those of life
prolongation. This solution, however, banks on empirical hopefulness
and so cannot be counted upon.
84
4.4.2
The Defeasibility of Needs
Another proposal recognizes that the needs of a given person or population may be defeasible and may have to yield to the more pressing
needs of other persons or populations, so much so that those whose socalled needs are defeased never really had them. To take an example,
all women might have been thought to need to be tested for the gene
for breast cancer. But in fact, unless there is a specific pattern of breast
cancer in ones family, it is unlikely that one has the gene. So the people with breast cancer in their families need the test more than people
who do not; and if the test requires resources that are also in demand for
many other, more pressing needs, maybe the people who do not have
this known risk factor do not really need the test at all.3
There are attractions to the proposal: it seems right to meet more
pressing needs first and to expend resources where they will do the most
good. However the proposal presupposes that we have some general
principle for balancing out the distribution of resources to people, and
this has not yet been deduced from the concept of needs as bases of
moral entitlement. Besides, there is no guarantee that, even giving resources first to those who need them most, there will not come a time
when resources will be exhausted even by this principle. After all, everyones life comes to an end if it is not extended by medical technology, and no ones need to live a longer life is, other things equal, more
pressing than anybody elses. We will all eventually need costly heroic
medical technology. We will all still become inefficient needs monsters.
4.4.3
Is the Location of Needs in Individuals or Groups?
A related solution is to reconceive the locus of needs. It is generally

assumed that the thing which has needs is the individual person. But
perhaps needs are had not by individuals in isolation, but by populations; or perhaps individuals do have needs, but only derivatively from
the needs of the populations of which they are members. Either way,
3 This is an aspect of Susan Sherwins proposal which is presented in her essay in this volume.
In addition to owing this and the next proposal to her paper, I am grateful for its succinct and lucid
summary of Braybrookes book and of what I am calling Braybrookes problem.
85
and returning to the problem of what to do about an aging person who

requires costly medical technology to remain alive, our first question
therefore should not be what this older person needs, but what older
people need. The answer to this is perhaps whatever will keep as many
of this populations members alive for as long as possible with as good
a quality of life as possible. And to that end, perhaps, what this population needs is not heroic, resource-costly new medical technology, but
better nutrition, community-based, preventive medicine, better education, and a higher minimum income. We could do much more for the
population of older people with low-tech preventive medicine and social reorganization than with the limited number of high-tech machines
we could produce.4
Notice that, by taking populations rather than individual persons
as the bearers of needs, we benefit conceptually by being able to consider what makes a population as a whole well off in terms of needs
satisfaction; this notion seems already to embed some of the conceptual
apparatus we require in order to do needs balancing: the mere fact that a
given member of a group is faring poorly does not automatically mean
that the group is faring poorly and so may not mean that there has been
a failing of moral duty in looking after that populations welfare. This
could allow us to justify not meeting what would have been the pressing
needs of an individual on an individualist analysis of needs.
Unfortunately, it is not obvious that groups matter except so far as
their members matter individually, so that the needs of the group may
ultimately be nothing but the sum of the needs of its members; and if
we think of the parts of this sum as constituted of one individual at a
time, we are back to each of these people needing heroic technology,
their need for it obliging us to drain away resources from meeting other
sorts of needs of theirs and of other people.
We might reply by saying that the very identity of the members as
individuals derives relationally from the identity of the group, so that
it makes no sense to see any of the members as individuals except in
relation to the group. Or at least it makes no sense to see them as having
4 This
proposal is probably a conceptual generalization of a specific proposal Sherwin makes.
86
needs except derivatively from the needs of the group.5 Thus your need
for aid in having your life extended merely gives you title to what a
policy that advances the longevity of older people in general would give
you. So you are specifically entitled only to what, on average (to take
one example of a criterion for assessing the state of a population), best
serves older people. And since having expensive technology for you
would mean not having community-based medicine for the many others
who could benefit by it compared with your having your technology,
you do not have a need for that technology, but only for the services of,
say, community-based medicine.
Problems remain, however, for we can still face conflicts of needs
between groupsthe quality-of-life needs of young people versus the
life-and-death needs of old people, for example. We might try to evade
that by treating everyone as members of one giant group, therapizing the
needs of the population as a whole rather than individual by individual,
and giving to each individual only the form of treatment which benefits
the most members of the population as a whole.
But while no doubt we are all in some sense defined relationally
to everyone else, we also have sub-relations in which inhere some
needs; and these, again, can conflict with the needs inhering in other
sub-relations, or even in ourselves as between the several sub-relations
in which we participate. (For example, I am now relatively young but
will one day be old.) Moreover, the larger we make the population in the
group, the more the problem of what to do for its members becomes our
original problem; for the more inclusive we make the group, the more
heterogeneous we make its membership, and so the more potential for
conflict of needs defined in sub-relations there is among its members.
If the group contains the young and the old, for instance, it seems more
likely that there will be a conflict of needs between the groups members. While if we say that what each member is entitled to is determined
by the needs of the group, then this presupposes that we have figured out
how justly to balance the distribution of resources to people generally.
Thus in reconceiving the locus of needs onto groups and away from
5 Again, I am indebted to Sherwin for her work on relational conceptions of persons; there is
a close connection between what I am considering here and aspects of her proposal.
87
individuals, I have perhaps illicitly assumed that, once needs are located
as inhering in groups, the notion of needs would permit helping as many
people as possible, and helping them as much as possible; and this may
be problematic for allowing us to ignore someone whose inclusion in
our policy would reduce the total number of people we could help, or
the degree to which we could help them. For how is this to be justified? After all, they too are members of the population. So why are
we allowed to ignore them? The answer is presumably that we have
not ignored themthey are getting the same treatment as everyone else
( community medicine, say)it is just that it is not really doing them
much good. But then it seems we should have a way of deducing from
the concept of needs itself, not just that needs inhere in populations
rather than individuals, but also the correctness of using a certain conception of what it is for a populations needs to be adequately met. For
why should not the test be, say, that the least well-off person in the group
is made better off by the correct policy, rather than that most people in
the group are made better off? But if the former is the correct test, we
have our problem back, for the least well-off people will again become
inefficient needs monsters relative to us. While if the latter is the correct
test, we are efficient needs monsters relative to them.
Finally, even waiving this conceptual issue, and even if we can go a
long way towards meeting the needs of a group conceived at the group
level with low-tech manoeuvres, ones low in resource cost, sooner or
later, the only way to go further will be with expensive technology and
research, and we will have our problem back; we will once again all be
inefficient needs monsters.
4.4.4
Do People Really Need Indefinitely Long Lives?
Another way to solve Braybrookes problem might be to challenge directly the idea that the mere fact that something would be a means to
extending a persons life means she needs that thing; for it is disputable
whether a person needs to live a very, very long life. Suppose there
were a way to keep a rabbit alive indefinitely: does the rabbit really
need to live forever, especially if the means involves virtually starving
all the other rabbits? Now suppose we can do this for a person. Does
88
she really need to live indefinitely? Why? Perhaps it would be nice

for hershe might like it or want it, and so might her friends, family,
colleagues. But that it would make her and various other people happy
does not entail that she needs it. No doubt there are various projects her
being alive would allow her to prosecute. But does she need to complete
indefinitely many projects? Is there any need that she be the one to do
all of them?
This line of argument may not work, however, for our conception
of what someone needs to have had a full, satisfactory life is probably
something whose boundaries gradually expand as the possibility of a
longer life expands. Perhaps when life spans were shorter it would have
been thought extravagant to have a life much more than seventy years,
and it would have been doubted whether anyone needed to live much
longera seventy-year span would have been long enough to find love,
raise a family, have a career or two, be a decent citizen, experiment
with alternative lifestyles, see what there was to see of the world, cultivate ones potentials and talents, make some mistakes and atone for
them. What need to live much longer? But now that people can live
to be eighty, ninety, a hundred, there seems to be all that much more
to experience and dothere is now the prospect of a long, healthy, and
peaceful retirement, extended grandparenting, travel, new hobbies, extended education, seniors political activism. Our conception of what
it is to have lived as long as one needed to live for a good and full life
has expanded, and will keep expanding. And why should it not?6
4.4.5
Needs to Life Extension Not Really More Pressing Than

So-Called Less Basic Needs
But maybe we are wrong to think of the means to life prolongation

as representing greater or more pressing or higher-priority needs than
those that would have to go unmet to meet them. Why, after all, does
6 I should acknowledge that Braybrooke was more interested in the problem of the resource
needs of those experiencing medical difficulties in mid-life, a time when, by any measure, they
had not yet lived a full life; but the logic of the problem is the same for older people, especially
as our conception of a reasonably full and long life expands. Indeed, the logic is starker for older
people, since aging and its infirmities are inevitable and so ubiquitous.
89
a given person need to live another day? Answer: in order to do the

things persons trying to live a good life do in a given daygo to a
movie, maybe. But a given younger person not on deaths door without
expensive technology to rescue her might need to go to the movie too.
Looked at perhaps a bit cynically, a life is nothing but a string of days
full of miscellaneous projects, and so the need to live, and the need
for the means of continuing to live, is nothing but a need to advance
projects. But we all have projects, no ones automatically more valuable
or pressing than anyone elses. So why should the fact that a given
person requires a lot of resource-costly medical technology to engage in
her next project mean that its requirements should have higher priority
than, say, mine, which need nothing but a movie ticket? That you will
die without the machinery sounds like a big, trumping argument, but all
you are going to do with your technology is, say, go to a movie. So now
we are comparing your going to a movie, figuratively speaking, with my
going; and why should you win? Why should I renounce my ticket to
finance your machine just so you can go to the movie instead of me?
4.4.6 Meeting Basic Needs versus Meeting the Needs the Meeting
of Which Make Life Worth Living
Relatedly, if you are not even going to go to the moviemaybe no one
can afford movies after we all pay for your machinewhy stay alive at
all? What is the point if you cannot, say, go to movies? It is implausible
that we should have to trade off what makes life worth living just to
make more life, whether the trade-off is within one persons life, or
between the lives of two.
4.4.7
Meeting Other Peoples Needs as Not Really Being a Cost to

the Meeting of Our Own Needs Given That We Are Needs
Altruists
Yet another way we might go is to observe that peoples needs overlap in

this sense: if it is true that one persons seeing that another person needs
something inclines the first person to ensure that the second has her need
met (as was hypothesized of needs as part of what makes needs-based
90
grounding of entitlements attractive), then perhaps the first person has

a need to see the second persons need met. But if one of our needs is
to see other peoples needs met, so that meeting their needs is part of
meeting ours, then funnelling resources to them is not seen by us as a
resource cost to us and the meeting of our needs. Returning to utilitarianism, relative to me, a disabled person is not an inefficient utility
monster if I derive happiness from the happiness of the disabled; for
then I would not experience the funnelling of resources to the disabled
as a cost to my resources. And relative to a disabled person, I am not
an efficient utility monster if she derives happiness from the happiness
of the non-disabled, for then she would not experience the funnelling of
resources to them as costs to her resources.
This can only take us so far, however. For at some point, my needs
being defined as needing the meeting of your needs must ground out in
a need defined independently of other peoples needs. And in any case,
it is certainly false from the start that our only needs are for meeting
others needs. But if we have any other needs, and if meeting them could
require an indefinitely long life, it will be possible for life-prolongation
needs to swamp all other needs.
4.4.8
Needs as Relative to Projects Approved by Communities;

Re-Choosing Needs
Braybrooke himself in effect provides the materials for a more promising solution. He sees needs as functions of the extension of the term
needs in a linguistic community. This extension is determined by the
projects which the community endorses as permissible or important,
with the most basic needs being things that are means to the pursuit of
virtually any project. But then it might be an option to have a community alter its conception of appropriate projects, thence to alter what
will count as needs; and perhaps one factor in any such self-chosen
cultural evolution would be the co-tenability of its projects given finite
resources. A community might choose, then, to have the project of living a very long life not be among the projects it recognizes as important.
To be sure, there are issues this proposal raises:
91
1. It implies that communities choose their cultures reflectively and

deliberately; and while this may be true to a degree, much of a
cultures evolution occurs without such self-direction.
2. Even if communities choose their cultureschoose the projects
they find acceptable as options for people within the culture
it seems intelligible to imagine a community making a mistake
about whether a project should be permitted. But then, in making
decisions to put accepted projects into equilibrium with available
resources, it is presumably possible for a community unjustly to
limit or permit projects. And if the genuineness of a need in turn
depends on the correctness of cultural decisions about whether
to embrace or eschew projects, it follows that there are cultureindependent standards on somethings being a need. In that case,
however, it is notor not justthe community approving or not
approving certain projects that means people do or do not need the
means to them, but these independent standards. So it is the standards which are doing the work; and so for us to use this solution,
we must figure out what the standards are.
But let us waive this worry for a moment; let us suppose then that
a community cannot make a mistake: someone needs x just if the
community has approved her project and x is instrumental to her
prosecuting it. Then there is another problem:
3. Needs then seem less empirical, and more stipulative, and so less
suitable to answering the meta-ethical questions the answers to
which I advertised as among the attractions of seeing moral entitlements to ground in needs. At the very least, needs would be
empirical only in that it is empirical which stipulations a community has made.
Another difficulty with this approach is:
4. It solves the problem by an illegitimate kind of fiat: if we find that
our community has tacitly embraced the project of people having
indefinitely long lives, and if we find that this is draining away
resources from every other project, we just decide no longer to
92
embrace that project. But this seems no different from simply

refusing to meet peoples extant needs. It is too easy a way out,
not to say an immoral way. At the least, surely principles of
procedural justice are violated. People are entitled to know what
the rules are and not to have the prospects of their presumptively
community-approved projects yanked out from under them. We
could get around some of this by giving notice that, from now on,
no new beginnings of projects of a certain sort will be approved;
but there would still be all those people who have well begun the
project of extending their lives, people who will continue to drain
all the resources. A final difficulty with the proposal is:
5. If there are constraints of procedural justice on its implementation, then unless these can be analysed from the concept of needs,
again, it is not needs that are grounding entitlements, but something else, or needs plus something else.
4.4.9
The Conceptual Analysis of Needs; the Axiomatics of Needs
I do not have room to deal with all of the difficulties with the previous proposal. But I see a way to begin rehabilitating it if we combine
it with some conceptual analysis of the notion of needs. The problem
has turned out to be that of how to resolve conflicts of needs, the conflict between basic and less basic needs, and between the basic needs of
some persons and the less basic needs of others. It is obvious from the
medical technology problem that there is no purely practical solution to
the conflict: if living a long time is an acceptable project, then the basic needs of people seem expandable indefinitely as life-prolongation
technology improves. The only hope of a permanent solution, then, is
conceptual. And the form of conceptual solution I shall suggest is that
the logic of needs is more like that of rights: just as your rights and mine
stand as mutual limits on each other, so my needs and yours mutually
limit each other. This could work in either of two ways: it may be that it
cannot be true that you have a certain need if some need of mine would
have to go unmet in order to meet yours. Or it may be that, while we can
have needs in conflict, the status of ones needs as serving as a basis for
93
ones moral entitlement to resources is limited by the status of the needs

of others as serving as a basis for their moral entitlement to resources.
Along these lines, we can articulate, by conceptual analysis, some axioms from the idea that needs are the basis of resource entitlements. All
other things equal, surely
a It is better that the needs of more people are met than less.
b It is better that the needs of a given person are met well rather than
poorly.
c No ones needs have automatic title to be met if the cost is that no
one elses needs would be met.
d A person has title to have her most pressing needs met even if this
is at the cost of other people having their less pressing needs fully
met, provided their needs are still met fairly well.
e If two people equally need something, and there are resources to
give it to only one, a morality of needs is silent on who should get
itsomething else must break the tie.
f If a certain distribution of resources would meet all of everyones needs, it is the morally correct distribution (and if more than
one distribution would do this, any of them can count as correct,
though perhaps depending on the implementation of an appropriate symmetry-breaking technique and the official community acceptance of the chosen distribution).
g If, compared with any other arrangement (and failing the possibility in (f)), meeting a given persons needs more fully than the
needs of all others are met would result in more peoples needs
being met, and in these needs being met more fully, then this is a
correct arrangement (again, with a clause to handle tied systems of
doing this, where the other systems do it by privileging a different
person).
h No person is such that, independently of other considerations,
their needs deserve to be met rather than those of some other person.
94
i No person is such that, independently of other considerations,

their needs deserve to be met more fully than those of some other
person.7
These axioms afford a solution to our problem, at least if I am right
that the need to live another day is no more pressing than the needs
of a person not immediately at risk of dying. For then the need to live
another day is just the need to do whatever one was going to do that day;
and both of these people have that need. But since this means that these
two people have needs tied for being basic and pressing, then, by axiom
(e), needs ethics has nothing to say about which of the two should have
their need met. We may use a symmetry-breaking technique. Political
negotiation might be part of the process of breaking the tie, perhaps the
sort of negotiation we see during elections about how much priority to
assign health care in the national budget and in the process of interest
groups lobbying policymakers. (Axiom (e), then, goes a long way to
deriving procedural justice from the notion of needs as entitlements.)
Furthermore, if needs are to base moral entitlements to resources,
if resources are finite, and if needs come into existence by communities
approving potential projects, and approving the choosing of them by
certain individuals, then perhaps something is only a legitimate project
if its foreseeable resource requirements are not incompatible with those
that will result from other people in the community making their approved choices among approved projects. For recall axiom (f), that a
resource distribution is correct if it meets all of everyones needs. There
appear to be two ways to bring about such a distribution: we can find
the resources to meet all needs; or, considering the situation ab initio,
as if prior to any needs existing, we can be careful to create only needs
that the totality of available resources can meet.
Let me develop this second strategy: suppose that, by approving
projects and their selection by individuals, we in effect allow to come
into existence needs not all of which can be met given finite resources;
then we have brought into existence an unjust pairing of needs and re7 Probably more axioms could be given than these; these ones could be given a more hierarchical structure, and they could be more perspicuously shown to follow from the notion of needs
as entitlements. Projects for another time.
95
sources compared with a possible arrangement in which all peoples

needs could all be fully met given available resources. So projects must
be co-feasible given resources, and people allowed to choose among
those projects only in ways co-feasible given the permitted choices of
others.
This is something we already take care to ensure in our culture. We
restrict the number of people who can be members of certain professions, or who can be funded artists; sometimes we require or allow
people to compete for the privilege of having a certain project, in part
to make sure that people having it is not an excessive drain on resources
needed for other peoples projectsthink of grant and scholarship competitions. All of this is consistent with the axiomatics of needs. And
it solves our problem, provided, again, that life-prolongation needs are
just project needs (or provided that living a long life is a separate project
able to be approved or not independently of certain other projects);
for then life-prolongation needs are limited in their permissible extent by the co-feasibility constraint. That is, if life-prolongation needs
are, project-wise, no more pressing than those associated with any other
project, then they may be permissibly limited.8
This would be consistent with the possibility I mooted earlier of
its being intelligible for a community to make a mistake in approving
projects, and so in allowing supposed needs to come into existence by
these approvals. For, arguably, no community has successfully created
genuine needs if its so-called needs violate the needs axioms. In particular, no community has successfully created genuine needs if its so-called
needs violate the constraint (axiom (f)) that needs, and so projects and
the numbers of people allowed to participate in certain projects, must
8 It might be objected that, while we can avoid failing to meet peoples needs by failing to
approve projects, or by failing to approve individual peoples choosing certain projects, thus preventing the needs from coming into existence, we may also be harming people by doing this; for
we are in effect limiting various opportunities of people. The reply is that we are doing this justly,
and that allowing these opportunities, because it would result in reductions in the social capacity
to meet needs, extant or potential, would itself be unjust; and if Braybrooke is right that meeting
peoples basic needs is the first moral priority in entitlement considerations, then failing to meet
needs would be worse than not allowing opportunities. Finally, arguably we are not being unjust in
restricting opportunities provided we follow procedural justice in distributing themfor example,
provided we break ties in unbiased ways.
96
be co-tenable given finite resources. We can then say that people who
plead that they have a need, where their having the so-called need met
would involve a total drain on resources, never really had that need in
the first place, because the project that is costing all of these resources
was never correctly approvable.
This meets the concern of another point raised above that it is wrong
to refuse to meet peoples extant needs just because they have become
huge resource drains. For the needs in question are now revealed never
to have been legitimate, since they violate the needs axioms. But what
about the procedural justice issue, people having a right not to have
their projects cancelled without notice? Again, axiom(e) to the rescue: the projects of those who are having resources drained away by
the longevity project of others also have such rights; it is sad that the
resource drain was not anticipated, but we now have a tie on claims;
and this can be resolved, again, by political negotiation and symmetrybreaking.
Note that all of this solves the problem as I formulated it earlier in
terms of needs monsters. For this solution makes both kinds of monster impossible, since both drain all resources in ways we now see are
incompatible with the axioms that conceptually define needs as bases
of moral entitlements: no one can be allowed projects whose existence
would create needs which would consume all the resources required to
meet other peoples needs, on pain of violating axioms (f), (h), and (i).
Still, there are troubles. For one thing, this solution relies on the
claim that somethings being a means to your not dying does not make
it something for which you have an especially pressing need. But if that
you will die without x does not constitute your having a pressing need
for x, what on earth does? Surely there is something special about needs
for things required in order for one to go on living. Well, perhaps what
is special about continuing to live is that the end of life is not just the
failure to advance a project, but the end of all possibility of projects. On
the other hand, if life-prolongation needs consume all resources, that
constitutes, in its own way, the end of all possible projects too for those
denied resources by their deployment on life-prolongation needs. So
maybe there is nothing special about life-prolongation needs after all.
97
Again, we have a mere tie, one we may resolve by axiom (e).

Another objection might be this: are there not biologically given,
unrenounceable needs, ones not just in common to all actual culturally
approved projects, but to all possible ones so far as we are biologically
based, resource-dependent beings? This a plausible worry. But it in
effect introduces a different conception of what a need is from the one
Braybrooke gave us. His account implies that, given biology and the
decisions society makes about how to deal with it, needs are, at least
in part, constructed by the community approval of projects and their
community-approved adoption by individuals; and so needs are, therefore, hugely plastic.
It confirms Braybrookes conception over the conception of needs as
biologically given, that many people have had projects whose prosecution required renouncing the so-called biologically given needsthink
of kamikaze warriors eager to sacrifice their lives in what they see as
a just cause, or athletes who knowingly compromise their longevity by
using ultimately toxic but performance-enhancing drugs in the project
of athletic excellence. Staying alive is not part of every project; so the
need to stay alive is not universal, and so not biologically given either.
True, many possible projects require ones being alive for ones prosecuting of them. But that does not automatically make staying alive a
universal, biologically determined, inevitable need; it only makes it a
means to certain endsends at least in some degree, for some people,
optional.
There may be a way to accommodate the nerve of this objection
more fully in Braybrookes conception of needs, however. For it may be
that most people, perhaps for biological reasons, value certain things
for example, a long and healthy lifeand this would induce people
to endorse these things as projects, and so these projects would be
found as part of virtually every culture. Nevertheless, the needs axioms still provide both the conceptual framework of needs and a constraint on morally permissible community endorsements of projects
there is still the requirement of the co-tenability of needs given finite
resources. While resources should be matched to needs, needs should
also be matched to resources.
98
The co-tenability constraint no doubt leaves a lot of latitude; probably there are many ways to meet it, and so many different kinds of
communities approved projects could pass it. But it is also a real constraint. And it may be that, given this, certain projects may be legitimately community-endorsed only by the consent of all needs claimants
in the community. Imagine, for example, a community that has become
obsessed with astronomy: by consensus vote, it approves the project
of devoting most of its resources to producing an extremely long-lived
astronomer; the hope is that she can be kept alive long enough, with
extraordinary medical and technological efforts, to witness the remaining history of the universe, even unto its eventual heat-death billions of
years from now. This would be a case where a co-tenable collection of
needs has been created: the astronomer needs to live indefinitely to witness the end of the universe; and all others in the culture are like worker
bees who need to do their part in making sure the astronomer lives to see
the end. (Offspring are raised to have the same projects.) But had the
community not come to a consensus on this enterprise, the astronomer
would have been an inefficient needs monster relative to some people in
the community, and her needs would not have had automatic title to be
met.
There are further complications here, however. For one thing, it

now seems that needs are not the ultimate foundation for entitlements.
Rather, preferences ground everything; for it is preferences that induce
members of communities to approve of possible projects, and to approve
individuals choosing projects. So the need for something, x, can come
to exist only if people in communities come to a consensus on projects
and the having of them by selected persons, projects to whose prosecution x is then a means. And this must make us ask whether, apart
from the constraints of the axioms of needs, there are constraints on
morally permissible preferences, and therefore projects, and therefore
needs. It must also make us wonder how it is to be determined what
a community is; who is in it; whether communities are obliged to be
such that the projects one community approves are co-tenable, given the
99
worlds finite resources, with the projects other communities approve;9

and whether it is permissible to attain consensus in a community by the
exile of dissidents.
There is no room to deal with these matters here, beyond observing that, while needs may require preferences in order to come to exist, preferences cannot make just anything a need. For possible needs
are constrained by the axioms of needs; and if it is needs that create
moral entitlements, then at the very least, not just any preferences can
accrue moral entitlements to be satisfied. Given the range of possible
preferences, a range which has, since Hume, been thought to embed all
manner of prima facie distasteful, and yet supposedly ultimately uncriticizeable, preferencesfrom the purely self-interested to the positively
malevolentthis limiting of moral entitlements by the required mediation of needs must be seen as moral progress. For it means that mere
preferring does not make right.10
9 These questions figure in another problem which worries Braybrooke: as part of the internationalization of culture, we in the developed countries have begun to see those in the undeveloped
countries as members of our linguistic community, so that the extension of our use of the term
needs now includes their needs. But then we are obliged to provide resources for meeting their
needs, again, possibly at the expense of making everyones life just barely above miserable in
terms of met needs.
10 This may afford a start on a solution to yet another worry of Braybrookes, namely, that some
needs are prima facie immoral, or at least morally embarrassing; but yet as needs, surely they have
title to be met, possibly in competition with prima facie moral needs. How can we justify meeting
the latter over the former from the concept of needs? Well, the needs axioms, particularly the
co-feasibility constraint, may so constrain genuine needs as to rule out the immoral ones. This
connects with work I have done trying to prove that all of peoples possible preferences must
be such as to be co-tenable in the sense of being co-advanceable, this ruling out preferences to
exploit other people in the sense of arranging the non-satisfaction of their preferences as a means
to the satisfaction of ones own. Note that this would require all beings with preferences to see all
other such beings as in the same community, and this would help answer some of the questions of
the preceding paragraph in the main text. Similar sorts of moves could be used to rule out for a
morality of needs, various extreme, selfish conceptions of ethics, e.g., needs egoism. For more on
the required co-tenability of preferences, see (MacIntosh, 1998).
Chapter 5
Canadians and Global

Beneficence: Human Security
Revisited
E DNA K EEBLE
Abstract
This contribution utilizes some of Braybrookes philosophical ideas about

responsibility to rethink the concept of human security, a notion rooted
theoretically in a cosmopolitan ethic. I begin with a discussion of the
ethics of state responsibility to protect doctrine as a new norm in the
international arena. Next, I bring out the distinction made between freedom from fear and freedom from want in human security discussions in
order to illustrate that the distinction is a confusing one and that the confusion is propagated in foreign policy. I explain the need to look beyond
questions of the states responsibility and examine the place of individual responsibility through the lens of Braybrookes schema of personal
responsibility for global beneficence. I conclude with what it means to
rethink human security as a shared responsibility between the state and
individuals, particularly in the Canadian context.
My thanks to Stella Gaon for generously giving her time to read the first draft meticulously
and help hammer out my argument (literally), to Susan Sherwin and Peter Schotch, for their leadership and comments, and to David Braybrooke, not simply for his response to this piece but also
for his exemplary personal responsibility for global beneficence.
101
CHAPTER 5. EDNA KEEBLE
102
5.1
Introduction
In A Progressive Approach to Personal Responsibility for Global Beneficence, David Braybrooke opens with the question What personal responsibilities do we, people living in rich countries, have for relieving miseries in the less fortunate countries?1 With this one question,
Braybrooke presents an immediate challenge to students of Canadian
foreign policy both to reflect on the notion of responsibility in the international arena and to focus on the role of individual Canadians who
live in a rich, developed state to alleviate poverty and hardship abroad.
On the one hand, Braybrookes challenge is a familiar one: students of
Canadian foreign policy have become acquainted with what responsibility may mean, given the prominent role that has been played by the
Canadian government in establishing and promoting the work of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS)
to create a new international norm appropriately labelled the responsibility to protect. On the other hand, Braybrookes challenge is a novel
one: students of Canadian foreign policy have looked at the responsibility of the Canadian state, not that of individual Canadians, in addressing
global problems and in understanding problems as global in scope. Indeed, the extent to which the individual figures prominently is in terms
of the shifts in government thinking (but not, so far, in continued government action) away from simply making the state and individuals at
home secure to making individuals and their communities abroad secure. This people-centred rather than state-centred approach to security is what distinguishes thinking about human security, which the
Canadian government has espoused but has failed to pursue fully, from
the more familiar national security thinking.
My contribution to this volume is reminiscent of Bernard Weiners
article in The Monist which appeared in the same issue as Braybrookes
noted above. Weiner, a social psychologist, points out that he is not a
philosopher but seeks to bring empirical data that might inform philosophical debates regarding responsibility inferences.2 Trained as a po1 Braybrooke
2 Weiner
(2003a) 301
(2003) 165
5.1. INTRODUCTION
103
litical scientist, specifically in international relations and Canadian foreign policy, I also find value in the intersections between academic fields
but seek to do the reverse of Weiner and utilize some of Braybrookes
philosophical ideas about responsibility to rethink the notion of human
security with respect to its empirical application. This is an important
task because human security thinking, which can be arguably grounded
within a framework of cosmopolitan ethics,3 has lost currency with
the Canadian government. Indeed, the turn to human security thinking
could be seen as a harbinger of global justice with Canada, if not in
the lead, at least marching in step to create new norms in the international arena, not merely with governmental and intergovernmental actors but more importantly with non-governmental ones. The 1997 ban
on anti-personnel landmines, referred to as the Ottawa convention,
stood out as a prime example of the realization of Canadas human security agenda. This was followed by the 1998 Rome statute to establish
an International Criminal Court in which Canada also played an important role.
It has been commonplace in the field of international relations to distinguish between the post-Cold War era and the post-9/11 era. It may be
that the post-Cold War era was indeed a time of optimism for states because the national security question became less pressing with the end of
the nuclear confrontation between East and West. But that era which began with the fall of communism in Eastern Europe in 1989 and quickly
followed by the final dissolution of the Soviet Union on Christmas day
1991 came to an abrupt end with the events of 11 September 2001. The
world has changed, it is argued, and in the post-9/11 era, national security trumps all. I make the claim that it is precisely because we are in
an age of terrorism that human security as opposed to national security
thinking becomes even more important. With the United States in the
lead, the focus on retribution as opposed to distribution in the international arena will only serve to undermine the security of all, including
Canadians. Human security is rooted theoretically in a cosmopolitan
ethic, but this is not being realized by current government practices. My
central argument is that Braybrookes ideas about personal responsibil3 See
Penz (2001)
104
ity help us to think about how this ethic might be more effectively put
into practice, and in so doing, point to a rethinking of human security as
a shared responsibility between the state and individuals in the society.
The literature on cosmopolitanism, as David Hollinger reminds
us, has exploded in recent years in critical and democratic theory.4
Samuel Scheffler states that despite different conceptions of cosmopolitanism, at its root it is the idea that each individual is a citizen of the
world.5 The problem, according to Scheffler, is that the idea of world
citizenship calls into question the normative status of an individuals
attachments to particular individuals and groups, so that an apparent
incompatibility arises between an individuals commitment to equality
and his or her special responsibilities to family, friends, and communities. However, Scheffler argues that this incompatibility only arises
in extreme forms of cosmopolitanism, but moderate cosmopolitanism
insists only that ones local attachments and affiliations must always
be balanced and constrained by the interests of other people and that
substantive norms of global justice [exist] in addition to the norms that
apply within a single society.6
This chapter is based on Schefflers conception of moderate cosmopolitanism which allows for multi-layered citizenship so that an individual can have ethical commitments to those both within his or her
state and outside of it. Beyond that, I also take as a given that there is
state responsibility, particularly if the state is a democratic one.7 The
4 Hollinger (2001) Hollinger presents the most prominent features of the new cosmopolitanism [even] at the risk of rendering the movement more unified that it is (236) in order to
distinguish cosmopolitanism from Martha Nussbaums universalism and Will Kymlickas pluralism. An interesting contrast to Hollingers review of some of the literature is to be found in
Nyers (2003). Nyers uses the term cosmopolitanisms because to think of cosmopolitanism in
the plural is to upset much of the received knowledge we possess on the subject (1072). Nyers
prefers the term abject cosmopolitanism not only to bring out the familiar us/them relations of
Western cosmopolitan theorists versus the global poor of the Third World, but also to problematize
the cosmopolitanism of the abject to bring out their voice.
5 Scheffler (1999) 258
6 Ibid., 260. Scheffler points out that the conviction that we have responsibilities to our families, friends, and communities is so deeply embedded within common-sense moral thought that
the idea of moderate cosmopolitanism appears to be stating the obvious (262-3).
7 According to David Miller, the concept of outcome responsibility as opposed to moral
responsibility allows us to talk about national as opposed to individual responsibility, particularly if
the political community is open and democratic. By virtue of enjoying the benefits of membership
5.1. INTRODUCTION
105
problem is that after leading the way in making individual (personal)

security rather than national security the focus of foreign policy (prime
examples being the anti-personnel landmines treaty and the establishment of the International Criminal Court), the Canadian government
has shifted back to a national security focus. This has been a retrograde
move: it disregards the radical change in the security problem which
has shifted from state-to-state conceptions to the dominance of terrorism and insurgency within states and the crossing of borders without
the reliance on state sponsorship. This move also disregards the opportunities offered to deal with the changed security problem through
engagement with individual persons in developed states, like Canada,
via non-governmental organizations (NGOs). These civil society organizations have been capable of mobilizing individual persons in Western states. Braybrooke argues that support of NGOs, or even better
fuller participation in them, offers an effective way for individual persons in Western countries to exercise responsibilities toward people in
the developing world. His argument is predicated on the recognition
that it will be confusing and self-defeating to demand optimal exercise.
Indeed, Braybrooke highlights that individuals in developed countries
just doing something now, and then periodically doing more following
comparisons with expenditures on time and money on luxuries, is what
a reasonable ethics will demand. Nor is Braybrookes argument simply
hopeful thinking: the anti-personnel landmines treaty and the International Criminal Court amply demonstrate how effective NGOs can be
in agitating for international measures to protect individual or personal
security. At the same time, Braybrooke is not as expressly mindful as he
might have been about the reasons that champions of human development might have had for thinking his appeal to needs is too restrictive.
However, his conception of needs intersects with Amartya Sens conception of capabilities.8 In Meeting Needs Braybrooke uses a criterion
in the group, particularly those in the cooperative practice model, dissent alone from the policies
of the group does not allow individuals to evade responsibility for the outcome of those policies.
Interestingly, Miller points out that national responsibility is even stronger than state responsibility
because the concept of national responsibility holds present generations responsible for the actions
of past ones. See Miller (2004)
8 Sen (1999)
106
like Sens of functionings (in Braybrookes case, as citizens, householder, worker, parent) and, accordingly, includes needs for companionship, social acceptance, freedom from harassment, and recreation
(including also sexual activity).9 This should do something to restore
Braybrookes credit with champions of human development. In that
way, Braybrooke offers a way for us to rethink human security and find
avenues for individuals (and not only states) to exercise their responsibilities abroad.
5.2
The Ethics of State Responsibility
The extent to which human security thinking can be grounded in a

framework of cosmopolitan ethics is found in the recognition that the
referent (or subject) of security should be the individual, and that individuals have an equal claim to fundamental human rights, to lives free
of violence, and to minimum necessities of food, shelter, and health.
These claims are to be met in the first place by an individuals fellow
citizens through the operation of their government, but failing that, individuals outside of their country are obligated to meet these claims
through their governments. In the parlance of international relations
predicated on the separation of domestic and foreign policy, human
security is first and foremost a domestic matter because it raises the
obligations of states to their own citizens to protect their rights, ensure
safety from threats both at home and abroad, and provide a minimum
standard of living.10 When states fail in meeting these obligations, it
becomes a foreign policy matter for other states because these states
must then step in to assist such individuals in need. This stems from
obligations of the citizens of one country to those of another with states
acting as agents for their populations.11
Thinking about security in terms of the individual is a clear departure from the dominant conventional understanding of security in international relations. To the extent that ethical considerations enter into
9 Braybrooke
(1987a)
(2001) 46
11 Ibid. 43
10 Penz
5.2. THE ETHICS OF STATE RESPONSIBILITY
107
the states calculus, such considerations would apply only to its own
citizens. If politics stops at the waters edge12 a phrase that implies
that national security issues are not subject to debate and the democratic
state must proceed with one voice in the face of the outside worldthen
ethics is also territorially bounded, and this suggests a Machiavellian
understanding for rulers when the states interests are threatened. Security in this sense is defined primarily in military terms with the state
dealing with external threats in an interstate system characterized by
self-help and anarchy. National security must be a foreign policy priority in order to ensure the survival of ones own state. The state must
procure weapons, build armies, and enter alliances in order to prevent
foreign attacks. The Cold War that protected Western states, including
Canada, under the American nuclear umbrella against Eastern countries,
which were in turn protected by the Soviet nuclear arsenal, was predicated on nuclear deterrence. The order created by the balance of power
between the two sides was also referred to as mutual assured destruction (MAD), given the devastating consequences of a full-fledged war
between the Soviet Union and the United States. Accordingly, considerations of international order necessarily preceded international justice
because the high politics dealing with the survival of the state (and
the planet) in the event of a third world war between East and West
took precedence over different philosophies regarding the organization
of political and economic life. Essentially, it was a good thing that the
two sides could co-exist. With each side having second-strike capability, no first-strike took place; and when the Cold War ended with the
West emerging victorious, a new world order infused with liberal optimism began to renew considerations of international justice and, more
specifically, to reorient the purposes of national militaries.13
As the likelihood of interstate warfare involving Western countries
declined in the 1990s, intrastate warfare in many parts of the world became more prominent. From northern Iraq to Bosnia to Somalia to
12 This oft-quoted phrase comes from Michigan Republican senator Arthur Vandenberg (18841951), an isolationist turned internationalist, who was a key supporter of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO). Vandenberg sought to create a bipartisan foreign policy for the United
States.
13 See Rosemary Foot and Hurrell (2003)
108
Rwanda to Kosovo Kosovo, internal conflicts erupted onto the international scene in ways unprecedented. The distinction between combatants and non-combatants was no longer respected, and the horror,
viciousness, and inhumanity of such conflicts were revealed by media
outlets covering conflict zones. Gone were the rules of international
humanitarian law which governed interstate warfare and protected innocent civilians. These were not wars of one countrys armies against
another, but rather conflicts arising out of ethnic cleansing, warlordism, and genocide, where the enemy was the state or specific ethnic
groups within it, as governments or self-proclaimed warlords terrorized,
maimed, and killed citizens within their territories. These violations of
human rights gave rise to humanitarian actions in which foreign militaries intervened on behalf of innocent civilians and challenged the
sovereignty of Iraq, Bosnia, Somalia, and Serbia. But such acts of
international intervention were arguably justified.14 Drawing from the
just war tradition, and the ethics of the use of force, Jean Bethke Elshtain develops a doctrine of equal regard as opposed to a model of international victimization as the basis for the use of force as a remedy
under a justice claim. She states: human beings qua human beings deserve equal moral regard ... [which] means one possesses an inalienable
dignity that is not given by governments. When governments commit [a]cts of aggression, whether against [their] own people or against
those who cannot defend themselves, [these] are stipulated as cases of
injustice that warrant the use of force.15 In essence, these governments had failed in their obligations to provide human security to their
citizens, thus triggering justice claims by their citizens on other states.
The focus on the rights of individuals is the cornerstone of the
responsibility to protect doctrine. Created in September 2000 and
14 The idea of humanitarian intervention is very controversial. As Nicholas Wheeler points
out, some question the rights of states to risk the lives of soldiers and other non-military personnel to save strangers; others point out that the international order among states is predicated on
differing conceptions of justice and that states, not individuals, are the primary bearers of rights
and duties in international law. Mohammed Ayoob highlights the critiques of postcolonial states
of essentially the actions of the West against the rest. Wheeler provides a powerful case for humanitarian intervention, whereas Ayoob carefully examines its major shortcomings.See Wheeler
(2000); Ayoob (2004)
15 Elshtain (2003) 67
5.2. THE ETHICS OF STATE RESPONSIBILITY
109
releasing its report in December 2001, the twelve-member International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, co-chaired
by Gareth Evans and Mohamed Sahnoun, has shifted international
discourse from the right to intervene by foreign militaries to the
responsibility to protect individual citizens.16 Although this responsibility is borne, first and foremost, by governments, thus reaffirming the
sovereignty of the state, governments can no longer do whatever they
please to their own populations. The Commission extends the responsibility of protecting vulnerable and innocent populations outside of the
states borders to other states if the state fails in its obligations or, indeed, is the source of the violations. Recognizing that military force is
a deadly instrument, the Commission sees it as but one element of the
responsibility continuum: the responsibility to prevent, the responsibility to react, and the responsibility to rebuild. The focus on the
justness of military interventionthat is, the responsibility to react
comes about because the use of militaries for humanitarian purposes is a
relatively new norm, exemplifying human security thinking. Indeed, the
personnel of foreign militaries who may have to fight in order to protect
vulnerable populations are arguably just warriors because the actions
of their governments have been legitimated by the fulfillment of six criteria: right authority, just cause, right intention, last resort, proportional
means, and reasonable prospects.
The ideal of responsibility of states conceived in this way, however,
brings up questions of how it would come into force. One of the primary
reasons for the establishment of the Commission was to rectify the inaction of the international community for the massacres in Rwanda, in
which 800,000 people were killed as other states stood by and did nothing to help the population. The prevention of another Rwanda impelled
the Commission to think realistically about how the responsibility to
protect doctrine could become a guiding principle for state action; it
led the Commission to place the authority in the hands of the United
Nations Security Council and to reaffirm the centrality of certain states
and their militaries. In that way, the responsibility to protect doctrine,
which would nominally obligate each state, was in reality a principle for
16 See
RTP (2001); RTP2 (2001)
110
large states and was therefore not unlike the collective security principle
already enshrined in the United Nations Charter, which placed responsibility and authority in the hands of the five permanent members of
the Security Council (United States, United Kingdom, France, Russia,
and the Peoples Republic of China). As Mohammed Ayoob points out,
the unrepresentative character of the Security Council and the threat of
veto that hangs over humanitarian decisions makes the Security Council
a less-than-satisfactory medium for the determination of international
will regarding humanitarian emergencies.17
Moreover, with the end of the Cold War only one state in the world
has the military capability to undertake the sorts of interventions that
could ensure some reasonable amount of success.18 That is why Elshtain argues that international justice, construed as an equal claim to the
use of coercive force deployed on behalf of individuals victimized by
their own governments, can only be realized with the United States disproportionately undertaking the burden.19 Invoking what she refers to
affectionately as the Spiderman ethic that with great power comes great
responsibility, Elshtain sees the United States, itself premised on a set
of universal propositions concerning human dignity and equality, as
the only country able to enforce international justice as an equal regard
norm.20 Although the United States will likely often act in coalition
with others (but not likely through the United Nations because Elshtain
sees the power of veto crippling UN action), American commitment to
the enforcement of the equal regard norm will result, she argues, in the
reversal of the lesson of the Melian dialogue: The strong do what they
must in order that the weak not suffer what they too often will.21
After 11 September 2001, the apparent vulnerability and complacency of the United States galvanized a Republican administration under George W. Bush to undertake a war on terrorism predicated on
17 Ayoob
(2004) 102
might argue that France and the United Kingdom also have the ability to intervene,
but it is not altogether clear that they would act alone without the United States. The examples of
Bosnia and Rwanda stand out in this regard.
19 Elshtain (2003) 64
20 Ibid. 73-4
21 Ibid. 75
18 Some
5.3. FREEDOM FROM FEAR AND FREEDOM FROM WANT
111
the principle that youre either with us, or youre with the terrorists.
American military interventions are occurring, as is clearly evident in
Afghanistan and Iraq, but these are being justified, not as exercises of
the responsibility to protect, but as pre-emptive attacks to protect American national security from, for example, al-Qaeda, who were being territorially housed by the Taliban and Saddam Hussein, who apparently
had weapons of mass destruction.22 Although the United States government has argued that the Taliban and Hussein regimes were oppressive,
and Afghanis and Iraqis are now better off, humanitarianism was not the
reason for going to war. The American government also highlights that
young Afghani girls are now in schools after having been denied the
right to education by the Taliban, but again the oppression of women
was not the reason for military action. As Mary Kaldor has pointed out,
the Bush administration describes itself as on a moral crusade in which
sovereignty is conditional for other states, but unconditional for the
United States because the United States represents good.23 Liberal
optimism regarding the humanitarian purposes of national militaries has
been eclipsed as the post-Cold War era has given way to the post-9/11
era. The 1990s may simply have been a hiatus, an interregnum, made
possible because Western militaries had spare capacity and time to do
human rights work.24 This was a period reminiscent of the two decades
between the two world wars, when idealism abounded in the international community. But these periods seem to be anomalies; the normal
state of affairs appears to be one in which responsibilities of states do
not extend beyond their own borders.
5.3 Freedom from Fear and Freedom from Want

The responsibilities that I have been discussing have been very narrow
in scope. H uman security is not merely about the use of coercion to
22 Kaldor (2003b) This was a forum on whether the U.S.-led action against Iraq constituted
humanitarian intervention. A compelling voice in the forum is that of Mary Kaldor, who supports
humanitarian intervention if it is understood as cosmopolitan law enforcement, which the war
against Iraq was not but rather a recipe for more violence and for global polarization. Kaldor
made these comments as part of the forum. My thanks to Stella Gaon for directing me to this.
23 Kaldor (2003a) 12
24 Michael Ignatieff, as quoted in Tanguy (2003) 148
112
enforce claims to protection of vulnerable populations. Human security is a much broader concept that includes meeting the basic needs of
individuals worldwide and that is predicated on an ethical responsibility to reorient security around the individual in a redistributive sense,
obligating those who have to those who have not.25 This conceptualization draws our focus away from world conflict to world poverty, and
especially to the extent to which the worlds resources are controlled
and consumed by a small, rich minority who should take responsibility for the impoverished, desperate, and often fatal circumstances of the
worlds majority. This rich minority, of course, lives primarily in the
West, and the problem is that most of us in the West do not feel the
weight of responsibility for the worlds poor. Indeed, Thomas Pogge
provides compelling explanations as to why global structural and institutional arrangements that benefit the rich harm the poor, asserting
that most of us do not merely let people starve but also participate in
starving them, by failing to fulfill our more stringent negative duty
not to uphold injustice, not to contribute to or profit from the unjust
impoverishment of others.26 H uman security defined broadly encompasses global economic injustices and includes demands for changes to
the existing socioeconomic order. This more expansive understanding
of human security is found in the work of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), which introduced the concept of human
security in its 1994 Human Development Report as encompassing economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community, and political
security.27 Referred to as the sustainable human development view of
human security, it is predicated on ensuring freedom from want and on
fusing the broadened security discourse with the development agenda to
address fundamental socioeconomic inequalities and the lack of social
justice in the global arena.28 In this case, the obligations of states are
not solely or even chiefly met by deploying their militaries for humanitarian purposes but by using development assistance, trade, investment,
monetary, and other policies to address global economic injustices.
25 Newman
(2001) 240
(2002) 214, 197
27 Programme-UNDP (1994)
28 Hampson (2002)
26 Pogge
113
The Canadian government has focused its efforts on the safety of

peoples, defining human security along the lines of freedom from fear
as opposed to freedom from want. It has identified five areas of priority in its human security agenda: (1) protection of civilians; (2)
peace support operations; (3) conflict prevention; (4) governance and
accountability; and (5) public safety. The government has argued that
human security thinking is not merely the development agenda in a new
guise but rather a recognition that the nature of conflict has changed in
fundamental ways: wars are being fought within states as opposed to
between them; threats emanate not merely from military but also from
non-military sources, such as human rights violations, terrorist acts,
environmental degradation, transnational crime, and small arms proliferation; and the safety and well-being of individuals (as opposed to
merely states) are integral to achieving global peace and security.29 The
focus must be on the human costs of violent conflict and the means to
remedy them. That is why the Canadian government became the principal sponsor of the ICISS when UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan
saw the issue of humanitarian intervention as too divisive within the
United Nations framework.30 In so doing, the ICISS report is a direct
reflection of the Canadian governments efforts to influence normative developments in international society ... (and indeed) a great deal
of the Commissions language and concepts reflect the human security
agenda that was so prominent a part of Canadian foreign policy in the
1990s.31
Human security efforts on the part of Canada also reflect a changed
politics by working with civil society actors in the global arena. For example, the advancement of the treaty on anti-personnel landmines and
the Rome statute establishing the International Criminal Court could
not have happened without the participation of key NGOs, such as the
International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and the NGO Coalition for an International Criminal Court (CICC), which were themselves
acting as umbrella groups for hundreds, if not thousands, of smaller
29 SFP
(1999); FFF (2002); McRae and Hubert (2001)

(2003) 202
31 RTP (2001) 491
30 Axworthy
114
NGOs.32 For Canada, working with NGOs and other like-minded states
became central to advancing its human security agenda. This was a different type of politics founded on rethinking state-society relations in
which the process was opened up to groups that had been traditionally
marginalized in foreign policy development: peace activists, social
justice activists, womens groups, cultural groups, minorities, students,
and so forth. Many of these groups found common cause with the governments human security agenda as the government adopted notions of
economic justice, gender equality, and human rights in its policies.
In that way, the revisioning of security along human security grounds
included changing the process to bring in societal voices, if not values,
to the making of state policy.
C ivil society engagement is crucial for bringing about change because NGOs represent the realignment of political identities that are
based not simply on national but also on transnational attachments.
For example, although the United States remains a non-signatory to
the anti-personnel landmines convention, it was an American, Jody
Williams, who co-founded the U.S.-based ICBL as six NGOs in 1992
and expanded it to over 1300 members in over 85 countries; who fought
tirelessly to ensure a successful treaty by working with other NGOs, like
the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), and with states,
like Canada;33 and who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for her international humanitarian efforts. Similarly, although the United States
voted against the Rome statute to establish the International Criminal
Court, it was also an American, William Pace, the executive director of
the New York-based World Federalist Movement-Institute for Global
Policy, who headed the CICC and who approached then foreign affairs
minister Lloyd Axworthy to enlist Canadas support for the establishment of a new court to hold individuals responsible for war crimes when
national judicial systems fail.34 Thus, human security reflects a politics
32 McRae
and Hubert (2001)

Mark Gwozdecky and Jill Sinclair point out, the anti-personnel landmines treaty succeeded because of civil society leadership, highlighting that paragraph eight of the preamble of
the Ottawa Convention gives formal recognition to the ICBL and ICRC for their efforts, an honour
not normally granted in a treaty instrument developed by a state-focused international community
(37). See Gwozdecky and Sinclair (2001)
34 Robinson (2001) 172
33 As
115
of empowerment brought about by the spread of democracy, the growth

of information technologies, and the impact of non-governmental organizations, particularly in the humanitarian and development fields, on
domestic and global issues.
What has become of Canadas human security agenda? On 27
April 2004, the Liberal government under Prime Minister Paul Martin
released Securing an Open Society: Canadas National Security Policy.35 Unabashedly realist in tone, the document identifies threats to
the Canadian state with a sense of urgency and impels the government
to act. The document spells out distinctions between personal security, national security, and international security36 in order to bring
out the centrality of national security. Only when personal and international security issues have an impact upon national security do these
two matters become important. The government states explicitly: National security deals with threats that have the potential to undermine
the security of the state or society,37 thus invoking, as evident throughout the document, a more traditional conception of security predicated
on the state as the referent. The concept of human security has apparently disappeared from Canadas lexicon. Precipitated by the events of
11 September 2001, this shift to national security language by the Martin government has led to the identification of threats at home. This
has meant that the Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, essentially Canadas equivalent to the U.S. Department of
Homeland Security, has displaced the Department of Foreign Affairs38
and has taken the lead in defining Canadian security.39
I would argue that the apparent disappearance of human security
language in the current governments thinking stems from the misconception that national security and human security do not go hand in
35 SAOS
(2004)
4
37 Ibid., 3
38 When Paul Martin took over as prime minister, the Liberals undertook major reorganizations
of federal departments. Apart from creating the Department of Public Safety and Emergency
Preparedness, the government also separated out International Trade from Foreign Affairs, creating
two new departments.
39 I take up what this means for Canadian foreign policy and Canada-U.S. relations in Keeble
(2004).
36 Ibid.,
116
hand. Domestically, the governments function in ensuring freedom

from fear on the part of its citizens goes alongside its function in ensuring freedom from want. Ensuring freedom from fear stems from
the governments coercive power: at home, that function is undertaken
by the police and other enforcement authorities. Abroad, as we see in
the responsibility to protect doctrine, that function is undertaken by the
military in protecting individuals. Ensuring freedom from want stems
from the governments social welfare responsibilities: at home, this is
often referred to as social security or income security. Abroad, this
is manifested in terms of the governments foreign aid policies. The
problem is that despite the recognition that conflict may be rooted in
deep-seated socioeconomic inequalities between groups, and that addressing these root causes is fundamental to conflict prevention, the
Canadian government has seen its human security agenda in a very narrow way. By continuing to make distinctions in human security thinking
between freedom from fear and freedom from want, the government
does not fully address the development side of the equation and the
responsibility therein. What the government does not appreciate is that
policies to ensure freedom from fear abroad are actually about restoring the national security of a state by other states like Canada. To truly
address its responsibilities to individuals abroad, the government must
ensure freedom from want. It is true that the record for donor states
like Canada in alleviating world poverty, reforming international financial institutions, renegotiating trade arrangements, crafting investment
policies, and the like is not good. Since the end of the Second World
War, official development assistance (ODA) policies, including those
of Canada, have had less to do with humanitarian objectives and more
with political and economic ones, despite the rhetoric to meet basic human needs and help the poorest of the poor. That is why Cranford
Pratts recent survey of Canadian foreign aid policy finds little role for
cosmopolitan ethical considerations despite the Canadian governments
commitment to human security, particularly during Lloyd Axworthys
tenure as minister of foreign affairs from January 1996 to September
2000.40 The Canadian state has clearly not lived up to its responsibility
40 Pratt
(2001)
5.4. THE ETHICS OF INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITY
117
to individuals abroad. How might we revive attention to human security in Canadian foreign policy thinking with the effect of giving greater
weight once again to what person-to-person responsibility can amount
to in the international arena?
5.4 The Ethics of Individual Responsibility

A modest proposal for rethinking human security is to locate responsibility at the level of the individual as well as at the level of the state
by drawing from the work of David Braybrooke on meeting needs and
taking personal responsibility for extending the common good beyond
state boundaries.41 Braybrooke provides philosophical arguments for
three sorts of claims which, I will argue, may help to revive human security in Canadian foreign policy thinking by placing individual Canadians front and centre in our understanding of responsibility. I address
Braybrookes arguments here and then conclude in the last section on
what his arguments would mean for Canadian foreign policy.
Braybrooke provides philosophical arguments for the following three
sorts of claims:
1. The concept of needs has moral force for all individuals who live
in rich, safe countries of the West, and some choose to accept this
claim.42
2. These individuals take on responsibilities in relation to social
organizations, and in this case organizations dedicated to global
beneficence. As private persons, individuals take on these responsibilities by supporting non-governmental organizations, such as
Amnesty International or Medecins sans Frontieres, as well as
41 My specific points of departure from David Braybrookes voluminous work are A Progressive Approach to Personal Responsibility for Global Beneficence (cited earlier), The Common
Good beyond State Boundaries (October 2003), made available to me in manuscript by David
Braybrooke, pending publication, and Where Does the Moral Force of the Concept of Needs
Reside and When?in Braybrooke (2005).
42 Braybrooke makes this claim, I would argue, explicitly in his Where Does the Moral Force
of the Concept of Needs Reside and When? and implicitly in his A Progressive Approach to
Personal Responsibility for Global Beneficence.
118
specific agencies of the United Nations, such as the United Nations Childrens Fund (UNICEF).
3. Such individuals have taken on the sorts of responsibilities that
move in the direction of a world community.
In Where Does the Moral Force of the Concept of Needs Reside
and When? Braybrooke juxtaposes his concept of needs with Amartya
Sens concept of capabilities. I discussed in the last section that it was
the UNDP that first introduced an expansive understanding of human
security by conceptualizing it in terms of sustainable human development. The UNDPs human development approach, encapsulated in its
Human Development Report published annually since 1990, is predicated on Sens ideas on capabilities: the idea that the purpose of development is to improve human lives by expanding the range of things that
a person can be and do, such as to be healthy and well-nourished, to be
knowledgeable, and to participate in community life.43 Sens influence
on development thinking has been pronounced,44 and his capabilities
(also referred to as freedoms) approach has clearly informed understandings of human security as freedom from fear and freedom from
want. Indeed, Sen, along with Sadako Ogata, former UN Commissioner for Refugees, co-chaired the Commission on Human Security,
which presented its final report to United Nations Secretary-General
Kofi Annan in May 2003.45
Braybrooke argues that the needs and capabilities approaches should
be combined, but that the concept of needs has greater moral force even
with those who might be less willing or indeed outright sceptical of
43 Fukuda-Parr
(See 2003, pg. 303)

and Deneulin (2002)
45 The Commission on Human Security was established under the leadership of Japan. Whereas
Canada took the initiative in establishing the International Commission on Intervention and State
Sovereignty, as discussed earlier, with the focus on redefining humanitarian interventionand thus
within the context of freedom from fearJapanese leadership with regard to the Commission
on Human Security signalled that countrys commitment to a broader understanding of human
security. Not surprisingly, the Japanese government asked Sen to co-chair the Commission in
order to help bring out the fuller freedom from want. For more on the difference between the
Canadian and Japanese positions on human security, see Acharya (2001). The final report of the
Commission on Human Security is available online at http://www.humansecurity-chs.
org/finalreport.
44 Stewart
119
giving aid to those less fortunate than themselves. He reasons that individuals will be more willing to place others needs ahead of their own
preferences but most likely quite unwilling to place others preferences
in terms of leading to further capabilities (e.g., enlargement of their
choices) before their own. Braybrooke points out that needs, often not
as expressed as such but rather in surrogate ways such as thirst, starvation, exposure, or illiteracy, point to a sense of urgency that often moves
people to act by essentially pulling on their heartstrings. Indeed, needs
expressed in this way tend to eliminate considerations of desert because
the needy could not possibly be responsible for their present situations.
That may be why Sens capabilities approach, which does allow for
greater agency on the part of the needy, may be less appealing to those
who would address the need. Given the international disparities in the
global context, we are talking about persuading those in the rich, safe
countries in the West, like Canada, to take responsibility for meeting
the needs of those abroad. Every human being does have a right to be
treated the same, but the treatment (e.g., food, shelter, health) under
consideration must be seen in light of those who need it and those who
have it and also can provide it to others. The argument for the moral
force comes in when we focus not on those in need but on those who
could respond to the need.46
In what ways do individuals in rich countries like Canada take responsibility? In A Progressive Approach to Personal Responsibility
for Global Beneficence, Braybrooke argues that individuals take on responsibilities in relation to social organizations. He focuses on charitable organizations as opposed to governments or corporations in setting
up a climate that encourages individuals to give. Braybrooke asserts
46 This statement will appear counter-intuitive to international development specialists who
have seen the change in approach to development from basic needs to human development.
Although the basic needs approach places people at the centre of development, it has been seen as
defining human well-being in terms of commodities as opposed to capabilities, therefore denying
(or being silent on) human rights, freedoms, and agency of those in the developing world, placing
them in a further subservient position to donors. See Fukuda-Parr for comparisons between the
neoliberal, basic needs, and human development approaches. However, as I stated in the introduction, by bringing Braybrookes Meeting Needs into the discussion, we can see more clearly how
Braybrookes and Sens conceptions intersect, thus restoring in part Braybrookes credibility with
champions of human development.
120
that, given an inclination to give (particularly evident when the moral

force of needs is invoked), an individual will assign herself or himself
personal responsibility to act beneficently, not in terms of a duty being imposed, but rather in terms of rules that the agent makes up for
herself [or himself], for instance, rules about the size of current contributions.47 The point that Braybrooke makes is that individuals living
in a rich country such as Canada, which has a tradition of philanthropy
like the United States (but unlike Sweden or Japan), may be (ethically)
guided to give in order to help remedy global inequalities. Thus, as
private persons connected to organizations which work toward aspects
of the global good, individuals may be encouraged to continue giving,
and indeed giving more as years progress by simply asking them to do
morenot optimally more, just more.48 According to Braybrooke, it
might be that individuals would find, for example, that a second sports
utility vehicle is simply a luxury that they do not need, and they can
redirect such monies to contributions the following year, setting the
standard for additional beneficence. Given active members of a tradition of philanthropy, some will give more and others may drop out
but new contributors will join, so that with each succeeding round more
will be given to charitable organizations such as Amnesty International
or Mdecins sans Frontires or specialized agencies of the United Nations,
such as UNICEF. Braybrooke states that on the progressive approach,
there is no neat end to the question about responsibility and the size
of contribution because the problem of global disparities never goes
away, forcing those of us living in rich countries to bear with the uncomfortable feeling that we are each of us falling short of doing what
we could do.49
Moreover, by taking on these responsibilities, individuals are participating in ways that move in the direction of a world community.
In The Common Good beyond State Boundaries, Braybrooke points
out that NGOs and semi-autonomous UN agencies, particularly those
under discussion, are pursuing aspects of the world common good by,
47 Braybrooke
(2003a)310, 316.
312
49 Ibid. 315-16
48 Ibid.,
121
for example, providing clean water, increasing literacy, redressing human rights violations, or instituting peace processes. When individuals support these organizations, they help to bring about a sense of
the common human good beyond their own state, and if participation
could be strengthened ... we would have on the international scene robust elements of a world community, people organized to pursue public
goods on the world scene.50 This would necessitate what Braybrooke
refers to as a movement from the mailbox relation to active community practices,51 predicated on a multi-stage program that would in the
end bring together donors, the national staff of the NGO, staff in the
field, and recipients, creating robust attachments. Braybrooke accepts
that our special responsibilities to families, friends, and fellow nationals
may work alongside our general responsibilities to others, particularly
those in need, throughout the world. He states that the multiplication of personal activity, along with the works of NGOs, would help
to bring into fruition Samuel Schefflers conception of moderate cosmopolitanism,52 predicated on new allegiances which transcend states
and national cultures. This may unsettle the self but in the context of
creating a melange of identities that allows the individual to flourish.53
In the end, individuals taking responsibility for global beneficence by
supporting organizations that work for the world common good may
be more likely to pressure their government to act in the same way.
As Braybrooke states, Judiciously developed, these motivations might
achieve a delicate balance between private giving and support for governmental beneficence, so that the very people who gave most generously privately would be most vigorous in supporting humanitarian po50 Braybrooke,
The Common Good.
51 Ibid.
52 Braybrooke applauds Schefflers work as do I. According to Scheffler, in Conceptions of
Cosmopolitanism, moderate cosmopolitanism about justice will be a compelling position only if
it proves possible to devise human institutions, practices and ways of life that take seriously the
equal worth of persons without undermining peoples capacity to sustain their special loyalties and
attachments (275).
53 Braybrooke also applauds Jeremy Waldrons work. Waldron fears the cultural exclusiveness
of the identity politics of community (113-14) and argues instead for the identity of the self predicated on the management of a variety, a multiplicity of different and perhaps disparate communal
allegiances (110). See Waldron (1995)
122
lices on the part of the government.54
5.5
Rethinking Human Security
The connection that Braybrooke makes is crucial to rethinking human

security: individuals matter as responsible agents moving in the direction of a world community. By supporting private charitable organizations and UN semi-autonomous agencies working towards the world
common good, they fulfill their moral obligations not only as private
persons but also as citizens to others outside of the state. They may
demand that more of their taxes be directed to foreign aid, or more of
the states efforts be placed in reforming global financial structures that
favour rich countries. If human security thinking is truly to be grounded
in a cosmopolitan framework, Braybrookes arguments bring out that
we should be paying more attention to the relationship between individuals and non-governmental organizations as opposed to simply the
relationship between states and NGOs.
Braybrookes arguments present a challenge to students of Canadian foreign policy who see the impact of the Canadian population on
the countrys international affairs as negligible. The government is able
to make foreign policy according to its own objectives and goals so
that when the government sets up public consultation processes or, in
the specific case of the Liberal party when it was elected into power in
1993, institutes a democratization of Canadian foreign policy, these
efforts are merely to legitimize the states interests not those of the society. Those interests may play out in terms of vying for prestige on
the part of governmental actors (e.g., Axworthy wanting to win a Nobel
Peace Prize) or promoting the governments economic agenda under a
smokescreen of humanitarianism. The point is that the government is
in control of foreign policy processes so that even when civil society
actors play a more prominent role, they are subject to co-optation, and,
in that way, their cosmopolitan understandings may not have full force.
The maintenance of national attachments is central to when the government acts. This helps to explain why former Foreign Affairs Minister
54 Braybrooke
(2003a) 318
5.5. RETHINKING HUMAN SECURITY
123
Axworthy, the strongest proponent of human security in Canadian foreign policy, had seen it not only as new way forward but also a way to
maintain Canadas role as a leading voice on the world stage,55 a voice
separate from that of the United States. Axworthy stated explicitly that
the best Canadian foreign policy remains an independent policy and
that Canadians want their country to be more than a junior partner to
the United States.56
However, Braybrookes arguments bring out that conceptualizations
of human security should include relationships between individuals and
charitable organizations. By locating some degree of responsibility at
the level of the individual in this way, we begin to see that Canadians through their actions may continue to keep alive the goals of human security despite the governments apparent reluctance to make it a
prioritysuch reluctance seems to be a response either to pressure exerted by the United States or to its own (mis)perception of greater threats
at home. Ensuring freedom from fear and freedom from want can be
achieved both abroad and at home. National security may not trump
all if Canadians as private persons continue to take on responsibilities
that move in the direction of a world community. Many of the organizations that are part of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC), an umbrella organization of approximately one hundred
Canadian non-profit organizations working to end global poverty and
achieve sustainable human development, receive support from the contributions of individual Canadians. If human security is to be revived
in Canadian foreign policy, we must see that responsibility is a shared
undertaking between the state and individuals and that the individuals
connection to the world common good through NGOs is perhaps the
path to cosmopolitanism.
55 Axworthy
56 Axworthy
(2001, 2003)
(2001) 8
Chapter 6
Braybrooke on Public Policy:

Precautionary and Fair; Feasible
and Ameliorative
S HARON S UTHERLAND
Abstract
David Braybrookes continuing exploration of how the strategies under

which public policies are formulated might be made more responsive
to need, and more successful, is the subject of this chapter. The paper situates his work on decision-making alongside two other influential
contributions: first, the synoptic vision, alternatively called the comprehensively rational approach, the economics model, and the rationaldeductive model; and, second, Herbert Simons boundedly rational approach. Both alternatives apply only to decision-making by individuals.
The paper then takes up incrementalism in the hands of Charles E. Lindblom and Braybrooke before examining Braybrookes overall dynamic
strategy that provides for decision-making by collectives (as well as by
individuals), as set out in his 2004 book on utilitarianism. The paper
closes with two recent examples of successful incremental policy in traffic management in Britain and France, a subject that has long interested
Braybrooke as a natural object for incrementalist policy strategies.
David Braybrooke is the most collegial of colleagues. I want to thank him for his ready and
discerning assistance with sources, for his willingness to share ideas, for solving my puzzles, and
for his gifts of excitement, patience, and encouragement for thirty years.
125
126
6.1
CHAPTER 6. SHARON SUTHERLAND
Introduction to Braybrookes Strategy
This chapter is an analysis and appreciation of David Braybrookes continuing exploration of how to improve the strategies under which public
policy is formulated in regard to their responsiveness to needs and their
attentiveness, in deliberative stages, to intelligibility, feasibility, and
public safety. His Utilitarianism: Restorations; Repairs; Renovations
(2004) recommends an incrementalist-utilitarian policy and decisionmaking strategy that would encourage citizen examination and discussion of policy problems, interventions, and outcomesactivities that
could improve and amend appreciation of the problem environments.
He continues his renovations in his further work on needs, rights,
and consequences (Analytical Political Philosophy, 2005), in which he
shows how the concept of needs can inform deliberation.
In an encyclopedia entry on decision-making systems for individuals
and collectivities, Braybrooke notes that there is a public good in having
a political system that meets at least the minimal conditions for popular
participation and control. Control by citizens can only come about if
they participate; if they see their opportunities and feel it their duty to
learn about and correct short-sighted policy results from the market or
from political bargaining:
A polyarchal system of decision-making will work as intended by its advocates only if this control in all its aspects is
effective (an empirical condition) and a large portion of the
population participates (a definitional condition ...). But no
system for decision-making will work unless the people who
have parts to play in the system actually take part. (Braybrooke (2000), 3316.)1
His strategy is constituted of his prescription to increase participation in deliberation, plus his alternative to the dominant approaches to
decision-making in policy literature.2 This latter is an alternative in sev1 Polyarchy is a term originated by Robert Dahl to describe political regimes of the real world
that are, comparatively, inclusive and open to public contestation. See Dahl (1971), 7-9).
2 Does Utilitarianism Require Perfect Information about Consequences, Leaving Coordination Problems Aside? No. Braybrooke (2004), chap. 2).
6.1. INTRODUCTION TO BRAYBROOKES STRATEGY
127
eral ways. First, it is a decision-making approach for collectivities and

for individual analysts, whereas the alternative decision-making methods are all designed for individuals. Second, it proposes that policy
choices at first stage should meet needs and that the evaluative standard
should be whether needs have been met. (Only after needs have been
met should policy move to supporting commodious living.)3 Third,
the Braybrooke strategy is able to incorporate, as usable message, all
contributions short of violence (although civility is to be desired as a
value in itself). Therefore those participating and observing can learn
from expressions of emotion, evidence-based or logically well-informed
inferences, and from experimental exploration. Fourth, it should be explicitly brought to mind that Braybrookes strategy, in use in deliberation at either individual or collective levels, is dynamic, proceeding
in stages and making use of new information in evaluation and further
rounds of deliberation and decision.
Braybrooke is a theorist of participation in the developmental democracy tradition, seeing participation as having as much substantive utility for the collectivity as for the individual, with particular insight into
how discussions develop concepts. Participation promotes the increasing intelligibility of policy alternatives afoot in the collective discussion, which makes democracy fuller, and it meets individual demands
for recognition and reciprocity as well as developing individual capacity for deliberation.4
It is perhaps important to communicate to a reader without a background in empirical political science or policy studies that contributions
like those made jointly and singly by Braybrooke and Lindblomwork
that is attentive and empirical without being scientisticare important
additions that are also corrective. Braybrookes confidence in the general public, although inexpert in subjects of which it has little experience, is remarkable, not least in contrast to a stream of American scientific political science that was mainstream in what we can now see
as the first half of Braybrookes career. That is the so-called empirical
3 The
term is from the last chapter of Utilitarianism, Restorations, Repairs, Renovations.

his Moral Objectives, Rules and the Forms of Social Change, particularly chap. 4, The
Meaning of Participation and of Demands for It, 54-84.
4 See
128
democratic theory, perhaps most clearly represented by B.R. Berelson

and Herbert McClosky, which held that the undereducated and poorly
informed probably could not be safely brought into the polity, and frequently argued that citizen apathy was functional for the system, the
opposite of Braybrookes position. The average citizen was found in
empirical studies of democratic beliefs in mass populations to be inefficacious, anomic, lacking information, alienated, submissive, cynical, low in citizen duty, and irrational. In Herbert McCloskys words,
Democratic viability is ... saved by the fact that those who are most
confused about democratic ideas are also likely to be politically apathetic and without significant influence. Their role in the nations decision process is so small that their misguided opinions or non opinions have little practical consequence for stability (McClosky (1964),
376; see also Berelson (1952), 313-30). On the other hand, the 5 to
10 percent of the population that makes up the activists, drawn overwhelmingly from educated and well-off sectors of society, had almost
uniformly positive personality traits, as dubiously measured by the tests
of the era. A typical item of a standard five-item test of political efficacy (said to predict participation) is People like me dont have any say
about what the government does.5 This statement might appear only
realistic to an individual who had never been brought into public life in
any capacity.
In strong contrast, Braybrooke has developed a plan for democratic
deliberation as a part of policymaking. He is confident that interaction
between people in general, in the received formal institutions of government, or in spontaneous groups that form around problems, will improve the intellectual quality and feasibility of policy proposals. P articipation surely has the effect of supporting the received decision-making
institutions, but it can also importantly correct and deepen what they do.
Braybrooke believes that participatory processes work best for policies
5 See,
for example, Robinson et al. (1972), particularly chap. 12, Attitudes toward the Political System, 441-82. L.W. Milbraith and M.L. Goel Milbraith and Goel (1977) present an
excellent summary of this literature. For another view, also empirically based, see Sutherland and
Tanenbaum, Submissive Authoritarians Sutherland, S.L. and Tanenbaum (1980) and also their
Irrational vs Rational Bases of Political Preference: Elite and Mass Perspectives (Sutherland,
S.L. and Tanenbaum (1984), 173-97).
6.1. INTRODUCTION TO BRAYBROOKES STRATEGY
129
for which local authorities have jurisdiction, such as traffic management, as opposed to policies like air pollution that exhaust or exceed
the resources and authorities of the jurisdiction nominally dealing with
that issue, but even there he believes that participation is feasible.
It is also important to take into account how pervasively if fantastically the synoptic or rational-deductive ideal once saturated fledgling
political science, with lasting impact in the policy area. Here the work of
Braybrooke, Lindblom, and Simon is importantly corrective. Synoptic
ambition was particularly striking after the early computers seemed to
promise unlimited, instant, and cheap computational labour, and systems theory modelled on biological models took hold. One sample of
Harold Lasswells thinking, as he laid it out in his 1930 Psychopathology and Politics, expresses a typical form of confidence:
As it is today we are on the threshold ... of assessing the realism of the intelligence maps upon which people base their
[political] choices. As an aid in this huge enterprise it will
be essential to improve the coverage and the depth of the
current flow of information that appraises unconscious as
well as conscious factors throughout the world social process. For the United States the following questions suggest
some of the major points to be covered ... Is the weight of
the super-ego becoming less severe upon Americans than it
was a generation ago? ... Is the rate of change different in
New England, the Middle Atlantic States, and other regions?
(Lasswell (1968), 318)
In an earlier article, Chicagos Old First Ward: A Case Study in
Political Behavior, (Lasswell (1923), 127), Lasswell wanted to first
describe and then predict human political behaviour as a first step to
control of political behaviour.6
6 See Robert Horowitzs essay, Scientific Propaganda:
Harold D. Lasswell, in Storing (1962).

Horowitz cites Bernard Cricks The American Science of Politics Crick (1959) on Lasswells restless futurism: Professor Lasswell is not a settler, he is a pathfinder and a border scout ... as the
wagons stop moving and the ploughs are dragged out, he always gallops off to yet more virgin
soil, leaving the Social Science Research Council to organize a Territorial Government (180-1 in
Crick; 127 in Horwitz).
130
While not everyone was interested in mapping and regulating relative weights of the collective superego from one region to another,
the same idea that cheap computational power could generate powerful predictive theory from empirical observations spurred speculative
work in social indicators theory and systems theory. Both social indicators theory and the most comprehensive systems theory were taken
up in government through the 1960s and 1970s. In the management and
allocation aspects of public policy work, this era saw trials across the industrialized world of planning, programming and budgeting systems
(PPBS), which were abandoned and modified without being thoroughly
understood by practitioners. PPBS is by design synoptic and centralizing, intended to increase productivity in hierarchical programs but
also to discern and manage horizontality, including redundant programming, all based in a fantastic efficiency calculus of both nested and
horizontal cost-benefit results.7 The thinking behind the development of
PPBS and its comprehensive, scientific, results-oriented style of evaluation (to inform budgetary decisions) is still important in the public policy process, although many practitioners assume it has been replaced by
the New Public Management. But the New Public Management, which
dominates the modern industrialized world, more nearly incorporated
PPBS than it superseded it, and one sees synoptic assumptions underlying the haphazard prescriptions and practices in results measurement
in contemporary federal Canada. Because hazard and small p politics by administrators can fill in where the synoptic method invariably
failsand in principle must failpolitical space is lost in public policy
areas.
The general purpose of this paper is to put Braybrookes highly original contribution into the context of what I take to be, as a student of government, the most influential work on how decisions are and should be
made. I present, first, an indication of what it is to try to be synoptically
rational in decision-making and then move to the first developed alternative to synoptic or comprehensive rationality: Herbert Simons idea that
analysts and decision-makers could make efficient strategic choices in
7 On PPBS, it is difficult to best Herman van Gunsterens The Quest for Control: A Critique
of the Rational-Central-Rule Approach in Public Affairs (van Gunsteren (1976)).
6.2. APPROACHES TO MAKING PUBLIC POLICY
131
information seeking, leading to tolerable outcomes as opposed to maximizing. I ncrementalism is the only really seriously developed alternative to satisficing, and Charles Lindblom and David Braybrooke are the
dominant figures in incrementalism. In the parts of its development that
they do not share, their paths are complementary rather than contradictory. Braybrookes strategy, drawn from chapter 2 of his 2004 book on
utilitarianism, is summarized to give the reader a fair idea of its comprehensiveness and richness. The paper then closes with brief examples
of successful incremental policies in an area of Braybrookes interest
traffic congestioncontrasted with policy failures that attempted major
change in one concentrated effort.
6.2 Approaches to Making Public Policy

For more than half a century, it has been broadly accepted by those who
work in and write on public policy that the acceptable recommendations
for how policy should be made are the synoptic or comprehensively rational method and Herbert A. Simons recommendation of satisficing
or bounded rationality. Both are relevant to the single decision-maker
or analyst, not to collectives. Because much of the synoptic prescription
has been implicit, each of Simon, Braybrooke, and Lindblom has felt it
necessary to describe its general requirements.8
6.2.1
The Rational-Deductive, Comprehensively Rational,

Synoptic, or Economics Model
Brian Fry, in his Mastering Public Administration (Fry (1989), 18990), finds in Simon himself a fairly complete version of the classic set
of requirements for the individual rational decision-maker who would
maximize chosen or assigned values. To select the alternative that will
be followed by the most desired (valued) array of consequences, the
analyst knows at least the following:
all the relevant aspects of the decision environment;
8 Braybrooke does credit P.H. Wicksteeds The Common Sense of Political Economy (Wicksteed (1910)) with a paradigmatic formulation of rational-comprehensive reasoning but obviously
cannot rely on reader familiarity with it.
132
all the alternative courses of action;

all the consequences of those alternatives, or, the probability distributions for the consequences;
a stable rank ordering for all possible consequences based on a
stable set of values, such that all consequences can be rank ordered
and that ordering will endure; and
all the relevant computational routines.9
In their book A Strategy of Decision (Braybrooke and Lindbloom
(1963)), Braybrooke and Lindblom identify another feature of the ideal
synoptic policymaking process. Citing Tinbergens On the Theory of
Economic Policy (Tinbergen (1952), 1), they note that the decisionmaker or policymaker must accept the responsibility of coordinating
the policy to be chosen with other policies (38). They also acknowledge a similar point made by Marshall Dimock in his A Philosophy of
Administration (Dimock (1958), 140) that the synoptic approach should
take into account larger institutional goals and objections.
In Strategy, Braybrooke and Lindblom adopt the term rationaldeductive method for the full-scale, one-off intellectual attack on a
problem. They imagine the form of its precision:
Ideally, the system [for ranking possible policies] would be
complete, not necessarily in the sense that it mentioned every contingency but in the sense that its ultimate principles
were rich enough to supply the intermediate principles or
the sequence of intermediate principles that would decide
any case that might come up. With such a system, the uncertainties of evaluation would have been mastered on the
values side. For, on the values side, determination of policy
becomes simply a matter of calculation, a question of feeding in the observed facts and thinking consistently through a
9 Fry draws from Simons Models of Man (Simon (1957), 241), March and Simons Organizations (March and Simon (1994), 138), and Simons Rational Decision Making in Business
Organizations (Simon (1970), 500).
133
sequence of transformations. One discovers the facts, looks

up (or derives) the relevant hypotheticals, and deduces by
strict logic which policy is to be selected. (10)
Braybrooke and Lindblom remark on the apolitical and, indeed, antipolitical nature of accepting the prospect that one analyst or a single
team could ever execute an authoritative single-pass solution of a public policy problem. The rational-deductive ideal, if it worked, or even if
it were only believed to work by enough people, would transfer an ideal
of science to the field of values and constitute an attempt to determine
the content of the public interest (9, 16).
They identify the important difficulties in intendedly comprehensively rational prescriptions such as crude utilitarianism: we have no
interpersonal calculus; hence we will have no agreement on conclusiveness; we have no rule for drawing accounts of consequences to an end;
and we have no rule for identifying reference groups for whom consequences should be taken into account (vii).
Before their joint work on incrementalism in Strategy was undertaken, Lindblom published his astoundingly accessible but equally astoundingly misunderstood article The Science of Muddling Through
(Lindblom (1959)), still reprinted in policy and public administration
textbooks.
This piece directly challenged the synoptic tradition.10 Lindblom
calls the synoptic option the rational-comprehensive or root method,
and refers to incrementalism as the strategy of successive limited comparisons, the branch method. As well as setting out the characteristics
of the two methods in text, he also provides a text table that summarizes
their main features. For the rational-comprehensive method, he notes
that a preliminary exercise in value clarification was necessary before
moving to empirical analysis of alternative policies, with the empirical
analysis developing the means to seek the ends that have been isolated;
that the test of a good policy is that it can be shown to be the most
10 In the 1979 follow-up and clarification, Still Muddling, Not Yet Through, Lindblom (1979)
Lindblom says that the 1959 essay had then been reprinted in some forty anthologies. The 1959
paper is still found in collections in organization theory, public policy, and public administration,
whereas the 1979 paper is rarely even mentioned.
134
appropriate means to the desired ends; that every factor is taken into
account in analysis; and that theory is important to the exercise. For the
branch method, he notes the direct contrasts: that value goals and empirical analysis are closely intertwined and not really distinguishable,
and thus means-end analysis is problematic; that the test of a good policy is that it will be recognized as such by analysts who nevertheless
may not agree that it is the one best way to reach an agreed objective;
that analysis is limited and a succession of empirical comparisons will
reduce the importance of theory. Despite the clarity with which he expressed the idea that while, ideally, the root method does not exclude,
in practice it must (80), and that successive limited comparison is a
method in itself, not a fallback, commentators misrepresented his work.
The piece was often used in discussions in policy courses as proof that
incrementalism was another word for drift, and that there was no alternative to attempts to achieve full understanding. Perhaps the main
difficulty was that professional policy analysts working in government
felt uncomfortable about analysing means as containing their own values; this would be not value clarity but a threat to their perception of
themselves as value-neutral and to the elected or political leadership.
6.2.2
S atisficing, or E nvironmental Heuristics: Simons

Alternative
Herbert Simon, in the previous generation of scholars, also observed

that the rational-deductive model (or economics model as he calls it)
does not directly help the decision-maker in a large corporation to perform successfully. It is Simons alternative to synoptic rationality that
still dominates the applied literature and that has inspired many variations. Simon does not discard the synoptic model, believing that it
remained an appropriate normative model for decision-making, a belief
he stated at least as late as 1980 in his article The Behavioral and Social
Sciences (Simon (1980), 75). But he rules out the synoptic model for
direct application. On his own, very clearly, in Administrative Behavior (Simon (1976), xxiv), and, with March, in Organizations (March
and Simon (1994)), Simon described the bounded rationality of the
individual decision-maker, who is intendedly rational [in the sense of
135
keeping the economics model firmly in mind], but only limitedly so

(161-2) lacking the cognitive power to attain full rationality.11 The
cognitively limited decision-maker should therefore find and be satisfied with an outcome that is better to some extent than the status quo, to
which Simon gave the name satisficing (in contrast to optimizing).
Individual decision-makers, limited in resources of knowledge, technical skill, and time, are however supported and guided by their environment of givens in the organization, which has greater reach and agency.
The organization provides, as Richard Scott summarizes in his Organizations: Rational, Natural and Open Systems (Scott (1992)), integrated
sub goals, stable expectations, required information [or at least information that is accepted as usable], necessary facilities, routine performance
programs, and in general a set of constraints within which required decisions can be made (47). Scott here consolidates Simons The New
Science of Management Decision (Simon (1977), 51.)
Reinhard Selten (Selten (2001)) picks out three ideas in Simons
early writings on bounded rationality in an individual decisionthe
search for alternatives, satisficing, and aspiration adaptation:
He [Simon] described decision making as a search process
guided by aspiration levels. An aspiration level is a value of
a goal variable that must be reached or surpassed by a satisfactory decision alternative ... Decision alternatives are not
given but found, one after the other, in a search process. In
the simplest case, the search process goes on until a satisfactory alternative is found ... Often, satisficing is seen as the
essence of Simons approach. However there is more to it
... Aspiration levels are not permanently fixed but are rather
dynamically adjusted to the situation. They are raised if it
is easy to find satisfactory alternatives, and lowered if satisfactory alternatives are hard to acquire. This adaptation of
11 Oliver Williamson, in a chapter in his edited book, Organization Theory (Williamson
(1995)), titled Chester Bernard and the Incipient Science of Organization, says that once Simon
had developed his ideas on satisficing, Simon argued that economists should abandon notions of
maximizing for satisficing. However, no research tradition on satisficing developed in economics,
and satisficing became instead identified with aspiration level mechanics (79).
136
aspiration levels is a central idea in Simons early writings

on bounded rationality. (13-14)
Simon aimed to operationalize observable definitions of aspects of
decisions such that his findings would be seen to be empirically founded,
leading to a science. He also distinguished facts from values, thereby
isolating values by virtue of their subjectivity and lack of a base in reason. (This is an element of continuity with the synoptic model.)
The part of Simons work that resonated most with working decisionmakers was what they understood as Simons promise of an efficient or
summary analytical procedure that could be defended as rational. In
Administrative Behavior (Simon (1976), 75) Simon stipulates how his
summary procedure is rational, within bounds or limits. The word
bounded describes the process of decision, not its substance.
Simon defines achievable or bounded rationality as the selection
of preferred behavioral alternatives in terms of some system of values [inter-subjectively accepted] whereby the consequences of behavior
[decision outcomes] can be evaluated (75). He has also stipulated that
the satisficing process is rational in that the procedure and its limitations
would be set out. In an administrative setting this would point to an individual making a choice, rationally using a selection of the received
views of the organization. This action could be reviewed by other officials, probably with a higher likelihood of review if outcomes were
poor. Simon also accepts that an unforeseen event or factor can cut into
the bounded process and change the outcome. This is to accept theoretical and empirical emergence that will make a heuristic inapplicable to
a model that had appeared to fit a problem.
Therefore Simon has been forthright that the process of bounded rationality or satisficing makes no guarantees of satisfactory outcomes.
In other words, a bounded solution is a routinized decision, where a
satisficing procedure in analysis is efficient but still contains an element of risk. Repeating in 1990 what he had stated in essence as early
as 1956 in his article Rational Choice and the Structure of Environments, Simon described bounded rationality in a metaphor: Human
rational behaviour ... is shaped by a scissors whose two blades are the
structure of the task environments and the computational capabilities
137
of the actor. And not even the structure of the task environment can
always provide good information because it can be misunderstood: decisions begin with goals and values, and are strongly conditioned by
organizational loyalties and perceptions (Simon (1990), 7). Simon had
nevertheless created an expectation that there were discoverable environmental heuristics that could guide routine decisions to good results
(in contrast to definitionally uncertain unprogrammed or one-off decisions).
There are objections. Those that are most applicable in the public
sector have to do with Simons steering attention to what appears to
be most readily doable, in the efficiency calculus of an organization,
whereas the most serious problems that administrators, analysts, and
political leaders seek to ameliorate are defined by and exist in a valuebased or political framework. Theodore Lowi, in the course of his
address (Lowi (1992)) to the American Political Science Association on
assuming his presidency, directed a stinging attack on Simons work.
He calls it reductively apolitical, because of its minute focus on the
decision or decision premise and says it had aided and given comfort to
the shift in political science from judgmental and evaluative analysis to
a rationalist reduction of government to just one aspect of the economic
system.
Braybrooke and Lindblom for their parts each generously acknowledge Simons role in encouraging theorists and practising analysts to
move away from the economics model. But they are not wholly uncritical of Simons bounded rationality. Lindblom, in his The Science of
Muddling Through (Lindblom (1959)), offers a succinct explanation
of why the choice of an aspiration level cannot do much to limit the
margins of a current problem to create a good fit of a received model
with a new situation, even if it appears of a type: the problem of sorting
through values is always a problem of adjustments at the margin [and]
there is no practical way to state marginal objectives or values except in
terms of particular policies (86)particular decision situations. This
is an example of his settled view, as I understand it, that feasible policy
designs are more limited in number than the problems to which they
might be applied, so that analysts could readily recognize an attractive
138
policy design but support it for different reasons. And to be sure, it is

always possible that the analyst is wrong about which environmental
heuristic is a good model for a given problem.
Braybrooke, in his article in the International Encyclopedia Braybrooke (2000), sees the utility in Simons approach of looking for standard features within problems over time and across problems. But he
notes the gap that Simon leaves as to where to start with a new [nonroutinized] problem or how to start recasting an old problem into a
more usefully approachable form.12 This is, to be sure, a point of departure for his own approach to decision theory, his judicious addition
of features of utilitarianism to a careful version of incrementalism.
Braybrooke of course is harder on synoptic rationality or maximizing because of its absolute infeasibility, in one place saying that
at best, it offers an idealized hypothetical basis for criticizing omissions in deliberation (3315). For me, however, Simons satisficing
has never seemed convincing. Given that it is impossible to satisfy the
substantive requirements for synoptic rationality because of cognitive,
resource, and time limitations among others, any summary procedure
for analysis applied to the real world is, in being incomplete, potentially
a satisficing procedure. The problem seems to be that satisficing might
be any incomplete procedure whatever. Alternatively, its claims to superiority due to strategic completeness might be impossible to prove,
because of the lack of a substantial standard as well as for measurement
reasons. Even if Simon is not making a claim for his strategic incompleteness as hidden optimization, his recommendation of strategic incompleteness in modelling heuristics to problems seems to suggest that
decision-makers can and should rationally tackle tasks in routinized areas by restricting themselves to the big found key features, the noses
on the face, which the organizational task environment, over time, will
have identified. Here it seems too convenient that a cognitively limited decision-maker would live in a world where causality within task
environments could collaborate to deliver moderately good results over
12 Personal communication, 12 December 2004. Braybrookes treatment of utilitarianism taken
together with incrementalism can address both new problems and be useful for recasting and
reworking older problems.
139
time.
Mary Douglas (Douglas (1995)) suggests that Simon made an inferential leap from Chester Barnards idea of the zone of indifference in
the preferences of any employee in the organization (allowing for their
performance of directives without hesitation and thus the accomplishment of organizational goals) to what would appear to be the real organizational world such that desires can be satisfied within the organizational context without optimization, and therefore without the calculus
(106). I take Douglass remark to mean that Simon extended Barnards
notion that persons would execute organizational duties most efficiently
when duties are indifferent to them in the light of their own convictions, to another idea that the environment behaves similarly: that most
factors in the decision environment itself would be irrelevant or neutral
in relation to what one could call core causation in the environment,
and so could usually be safely ignored. Douglas should surely not be understood as saying that Simon would have either believed or argued that
satisficing could be a more efficient way of optimizing, but she can perhaps be read as saying that Simon made a leap to a certain isomorphism
between the limitations of the decider and the apparently massive clues
in the decision environment under routine conditions. Overall, practitioners do tend to accept satisficing as a procedure for operationalizing
pragmatism, a local theory of usefulness, in their decision-making environments. Thus, in my opinion, Simon left his field without providing
actual robust substantial assistance to practitioners. And, as Lowi said,
Simons endorsement of the view that facts and values can and must
be separated is a problematic contribution to policy studies, although
intended to separate politics or values leadership from administration
(Lowi (1992), 105).
6.2.3
Some of Simons Successors
As one might expect, the hopeful train of thought begun by Simon

who worked in psychology, computer science, economics, and political
sciencehas been as widely taken up. One sees his ideas in use by
scholars who try to apply it to describing environments and also by researchers working to discover acceptably reliable prescriptive heuristics
140
in particular environments. As a colourful example of the descriptive

preference, one can cite Cohen, March, and Olsens influential article,
A Garbage Can Model of Organizational Choice (Cohen and Olsen
(1972)), in which problems and solutions circulate in the decision environment to be sometimes brought together by an astute decision-maker.
Gigerenzer and Selten (Gigerenzer and Selten (2001)) illustrate the
heuristics thrust. Their collection includes work by anthropologists,
economic theorists, mathematical economists, cognitive and other psychologists, computer scientists working in artificial intelligence, zoologists, biologists, and neuroscientists, among others. The many investigators seem agreed that any rationality we may find will be embedded
in survival strategies observed in local environments and that there will
never be a general-purpose algorithm. (But in his larger project, Simon was notably dedicated to a science of administration.) Only one
of the nineteen contributions to the volume considers how a collectivity might reach a decision. In Thomas Seeleys Decision Making in
Superorganisms: How Collective Wisdom Arises from the Poorly Informed Masses, (Seeley (2001)) the masses reach what is said to be an
objectively correct solution for the collectivity. The masses happen to be
honeybees, and their problem is to choose the best site from those available for a new hive. It is worth probing Seeleys observation-rich essay
on a hive as a super organism, because it models social behaviour in
non-human organisms or systems, the kind of work that systems theorists readily extend to human organizational needs (Seeley restricts his
conclusions to his bees).
In a beehive, Seeley judges that the swarm as a whole is a sophisticated and skilled decision-making agent because the cognitive skills of
each bee appear to be surprisingly simple (249). Seeley does not speculate how the honeybee scouts process the four or five relevant site variables to report in dancing to the other scouts what looks like a summed
score over several variables. The dancing by individual scout bees for
the sites they have visited among alternative sites varies only in persistence and intensity. Eventually consensus (all dancing scouts performing for the same site) is reached. The scouts and the rest of the hiving
swarm then leave to establish a new hive.
141
The scout honeybees collective choice is, in all the occasions observed by the scientists, objectively the absolutely best choiceon the
survivalist criteria the human scientists use to rank honeybee housing,
and impute to the scout honeybees, to be sure. The persistence of siteoriented dancing correlates with the presence of a number of features
describing the site: such features as entry dimensions that afford the
hive and its food protection, adequate food storage capacity for the winter, and proximity to a source of food. Scout honeybees stay on topic
in the hive site evaluation. No scout honeybee has concerns other than
those that define a workable site; no uncle is in bee real estate. Nonfunctional criteria would manifest as irrational scout dancing persistence for a site that is mediocre on the criteria necessary to the hives
survival. There is no such irrational persistence promoting sites that
are poor, again as assessed by the scientists.
I conclude, despite the title of Seeleys engrossing article, that it
is irrelevant whether honeybee masses are poorly informed. What is
important is that the scouts accurately communicate to one another relevant empirical information for a closed model that defines the best site
and that their collective dancing achieves an accurate site comparison.
(It is also fortunate in this problem that scouts whose preferences fall by
the wayside switch to dancing for sites still in contestation, and that the
rest of the hive swarms with departing scouts.) Each site factor in the
equation is necessary but not sufficient; all factors must be present for
the site to be chosen by the scouts of a hiving swarm. Thus the hiving
problem unfolds by formula. Seeley is cited above as saying that the
skill of the hive or the aggregate is in part the outcome of the apparent
simplicity of each bee, and there is a lesson in this remark: simplicity
is a form of discipline and it surely works for the scouts hiving decision. The aggregated wisdom of all scouts is not a simple extrapolation,
but the differences in the preferences of the scouts can be negotiated and
summarized in the danced discussions without serious lossas judged
by outcomes. The success in choosing a good hive seems almost less
important than the idea that the bees have a formal public process by
which the scout bees obviouslybut only somehowaggregate and
communicate their information. It is not fully intelligible to the human
142
observers as to how the scouts emerge with the maximizing decision.

But, as Seeleys presentation hints, because of the complexity and
undisciplined variety of human individuals preferences and motivations, human collectives face important uncertainties in outcomes in
even highly repetitive situations. In his Micromotives and Macrobehaviour (Schelling (1978)), Thomas Schelling shows that outcomes that
are inconvenient and harmful and thus irrational in the aggregate often result from the situationally rational behaviour of individuals. If we
humans ever have leaders as intendedly rational as the honeybee scouts,
they are alarmingly absent in many situations where they could be useful. Schelling notes that the easy cases in decision-making are those in
which the aggregate is an extrapolation from an individual. More difficult are those cases, of which the small p political environment in
a firm or a government bureau could be examples, where People are
responding to an environment that consists of other people responding
to their environment, which consists of people responding to an environment of peoples responses (14). Dynamics can be sequential or
reciprocal or both. Schelling uses audience behaviour as an initial illustration. Under voluntary seating arrangements, an audience will fail
quite miserably in its use of space. Individual seating choices typically
result in a distribution of spectators such that rows of seats will be left
vacant in the very front of a hall, creating crowding in the back and thus
disturbance by new arrivals of those already seated toward the back.
Performers may have the impression of playing to an empty hall, or to
one that is sliding away from them. The only process we have developed is to give power to ushers, who take individual preferences into
account only insofar as a developing seating pattern permits. The situation where we collectively recognize a settled problem and know what
our goal must be and how to implement it seems unproblematic and rare
in comparison to dynamic situations, individual and collective.
6.2.4
Incrementalism
For problems that change over time, where information is not complete
and may always be misleading to some degree, a strategy that can make
doubt part of the decision process is necessary. What is available is
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incrementalism, for which Lindblom and Braybrooke are the leading

proponents. One can briefly sketch their shared and distinguishing interests by way of introduction. Lindblom, like Braybrooke, is interested
in content-rich policy evaluation and choice, with features of fragmentation and seriality. He has, however, placed less emphasis on deliberation in comparison to Braybrooke, who wants to suggest ways to
improve deliberation in collectives, in respect to content and procedure,
admitting argumentative elements such as provocation.13 And, although
Lindblom has clearly shown persistent interest in and respect for peoples everyday ideas, in his insightful book with David Cohen, Usable
Knowledge: Social Science and Social Problem Solving (Lindblom and
Cohen (1979)) and in his own tour de force, Inquiry and Change: The
Troubled Attempt to Understand and Shape Society (Lindblom (1990)),
Braybrooke alone places emphasis on the concept of needs, for which
the most concentrated example is probably his Meeting Needs (Braybrooke (1987a)).
Lindblom is keenly aware of the cognitive limitations and the social givens that weigh on individuals. His book Politics and Markets
(Lindblom (1977)) emphasizes the indoctrinated character of the citizenry and the weight of business in politics. Elsewhere, more recently
in Inquiry and Change, he has described the ordinary persons cognitive
impairment and how we might work toward freeing ourselves of some
of the received and personal doctrines that burden our thinking. Lindblom believes we may invoke habitual patterns of ideas unhelpfully at
moments of decision or expression of preference. Thus, for Lindblom,
the givensthe noses on the facesthat Simon believed would provide helpful frameworks may well be foolish and destructive impaired
thinkingalthough, as noted earlier, Lindblom does not engage Simon.
In Intelligence of Democracy and elsewhere Lindblom works carefully to distinguish what he calls partisan mutual adjustment from
incrementalism. In the former, participants who are at least somewhat independent of one another take part in fragmented, decentralized
decision-making. The eventual winning policy is more like a happening
13 For example, see his article Toward an Alliance between the Issue-Processing Approach
and Pragma-Dialectical Analysis Braybrooke (2003b).
144
or spontaneous occurrence than a reasoned decision for which relevant

reasons can be given. It is unplanned in its content.
Neither scholar claims, therefore, that incrementalism is more than
a process that holds out modest hope for analysts and collectives that
want to ameliorate some of the problems that beset themalthough it
is surely the only decision-making theory that gives defensible reasons
for even modest hope and which can be applied to dynamic problems in
collectives. Incrementalist approaches depend on peoples capacities for
observation and attentiveness while manifesting doubt constructively as
evaluation; continuously thinking, discussing, and amending beliefs,
singly in Lindbloms formulation, and in groups in Braybrookes development of discussions with a direction. Individual analysts will
look at a problem strategically, disaggregate its elements, choose an
element that appears to be manipulable in a useful way, and recommend adjustments. To the extent that repetitiveness can be seen as a
possible platform for decision-making, this system might be seen to
resemble Simons bounded rationality. But, in my view, incrementalism is importantly different in that it harnesses doubt and uncertainty
as a motor for continued attentiveness. It recommends frequent evaluative phases, continuously probing and thus disturbing and amending
observers grasp of the problem context, amending common wisdom
about the problem as the work proceeds. Thus both leading advocates
want to see problem stability approached as an empirical question. Both
see perceptual fluidity as a good quality.
The small number of incrementalist thinkers who contribute to policy journals tend to put their emphasis on the feeling-forward perspective of incrementalism. Terry Connolly (Connolly (1988)) provides a
particularly communicative metaphor in comparing tree-felling models
heroic single-pass one-time synoptic analyses (38)with highly interactive meandering analysis, what he calls hedge-clipping models.
Clipping is a feasible approach to a task or problem when the defining
elements of a problem situation are decoupled. The advantages of a situational approach that is at the same time closely evaluative are that consequences can be corrected; solution criteria will typically be tolerant
(allowing emergent problems to be taken into account in the process);
6.3. BRAYBROOKES CITIZEN MANAGEMENT
145
action sequence can be flexible; and the implementation of a sketched

plan can safely be interrupted.14 There are many hedge problems that
we explore only after having made the first small intervention. Overall,
however, it seems safe to say that while incrementalism is present in
policy journals, and sometimes interestingly so, all subsequent adherents of incrementalism as a tactic for the individual analyst have found
it difficult to add to the substance of Lindbloms 1959 article.
6.3 Braybrookes Participatory, Precautionary Citizen

Management
Braybrookes contribution to decision-making theory has long struck
me as ground-breaking in that it is an open, political, and highly participatory approach to the possibilities in collective decision-making. In
his recent work, he has pointed to the gap in decision-making theory
for the problem of collectives:
Unfortunately, at the collective level, unless an autocrat or
a perfect bureaucracy ... is authorized to act for the collectivity, a problem arises about different criteria with different
thresholds being invoked at the same time by different people. Which are to guide the decisions of the collectivity?
(Braybrooke (2000), 3315)
He invites participation in a variety of forums as a way of assisting
people to refine their information and values relating to a problem, and
to encourage people to forge their beliefs into intelligibleand therefore usablestatements for use in discussions with a direction, including intelligible statements about needs. He also sees participation as
encouraging reasonableness in representation of needs and, of course,
as a way of identifying and helping a collective to work through internal opposition in non-violent ways that do not involve suppression
14 See also Connollys Uncertainty, Action and Competence (Connolly (1980)). Michael
Hayess Incrementalism and Public Policy (Hayes (1992)) also takes on the rationalcomprehensive ideal.
146
or exclusion.15 There is no attempt to separate facts from values. On

the contrary, he is clear that means cannot be separated from ends. He
wants to multiply opportunities for people to voluntarily participate and
become significant contributors to long-term deliberations about issues,
with a view to increasing the intelligibility of problems and of what
others make of them, both for themselves and others. As a theorist of
participation, he emphasizes the intellectual aspects of human development through deliberation. While group discussions may on occasion
be taken very seriously by the society and by the polity, Braybrooke has
no plan for a formal and political machinery along the lines of Dahls
Chinese boxes, in which jurisdictions are multiplied and nested such
that all continuing discussion forums lead into the highest state forums
where decisions that affect public policy and define public goods are
taken (Braybrooke and Bailey (2003)). Braybrooke, like Lindblom, promotes his alternative only to the extent that it will work better than the
status quo in bringing attention and evolution to received settlements.
A superficially paradoxical feature of Braybrookes prescription that
is also the key to its richness is his combination of incrementalism
and a version of utilitarianism. Incrementalism is by definition a continuing strategy for sequential passes addressing comparatively wellunderstood problems, yielding an improved probability that the trend of
change in the problem will be ameliorative and that consequences can be
managedimproved over one-time or heroic solutions. The strategy
is prudent, but not conservative as to ends. On the other hand, the ethics
Braybrooke adoptsutilitarianismemphasizes that the author of an
action is an agent who will take responsibility for consequences. The licence to act under an ethics of consequentialism is said to arise from the
preliminary, one-time and heroic, assumption that consequences flowing from an act will bear out the choice. Since there is little possibility that potential consequences can be anticipated, and certainly not
in one pass, there is no reason to assume that any well-intentioned action will turn out well within the period of judgment. Braybrooke sets
out how the strategy of making maximally prudential changes under
15 See chap. 16, Scale, Combination, Opposition: A Rethinking of Incrementalism, in his
Moral Objectives (Braybrooke (1998a), 311-30).
147
disjointed incrementalismwell-considered small moves designed to

meet needsconstitutes a more satisfying substitute for the moral permission that would in theory be conferred by working through the sum
of benefits over costs in human happiness, the (synoptic) felicific calculus. No such calculus is realizable. Braybrooke therefore incorporates the fallibility of human foresight and the tendency of the world
to surprise and to provoke blame as conditions of normal decisionmaking. For him, a determination to address human needs through reversible actions undertaken in a mood of cautious humility is the moral
and political possible.
Chapter 2 in Braybrookes 2004 volume Utilitarianism is perhaps
his most fully developed view of what might be done better in democratic planning for public policy, and the material that follows has
been directly paraphrased from this source. Stripped to its bones, Braybrookes recommendation is that both individual decision-makers and
collectives (groups, jurisdictions, and so forth) in social and political
life might adopt disjointed incrementalism as both a cognitive style and
as a strategy, and to do so under an ethics of utilitarianism whose first
priority is the provision of needs.
6.3.1 Braybrookes Disjointed Incrementalism
The summary features of Braybrookes formulation of disjointed incrementalism as an ameliorative decision strategy are set out in point form
below. The problems are those habitually arising from the continued
dominance of the synoptic reflex in decision theory.
Problem: too many value criteria confuse and overwhelm analysis.
Solution: move to a higher-order value for guidance; here needs
provide focus.
Problem: attempts to take into consideration all consequences before
acting will postpone ameliorative activity in difficult problem areas.
Solution: align the theory of policymaking with the revisionary
process active in current machinery and processes of policymaking in
which stage-by-stage revisions inch toward a better status. Once a
problem has been nudged in the right direction, the revisionary process
148
would engage to pursue further improvements or, alternatively, to

revoke unsatisfactory changes.
Problem: designing policy for large-scale or complex problems forces
analysis into ambitious attempts to cover ever more ground in the
belief that more work will bring an optimal solution closer; such
analysis is still merely incomplete, and still to an unknown degree.
Solution: study difficulties that are close at hand and familiar, adopt
disjointed incrementalism to separate facets into still smaller problems,
make marginal changes to these small problems, and subject them to
steady attention (above). An incremental change is defined as change
in an apparently relatively unimportant variable that is a feature of a
familiar problem, or a less important change in an apparently important
variable. A second definition is that an incremental change is one that
is planned so that it is readily reversible in substance and in its
consequences by current institutional resources and powers, and is by
virtue of close examination more intelligible to everyone.
Problem: general lack of time and lack of research in the implementing
body.
Solution: develop public attentiveness strategically. Start with a modest
change, invite participants (individuals and groups) to join the process
to suggest other alternatives or further adjustments and to bring
forward other values. This process allows for values achieved, but not
originally intended, now to be recognized and pursued further
(supersession): the revisionary process can work with any gain that
turns up.
Problem: precaution is often limited to the front end of
decision-making. Intellectual investment in conventional policy goals
can dominate thinking and stymie action; traditional thought patterns
can develop into doctrines.
Solution: precaution should be part of each phase. One can take an
evaluative stance, then deal with things as they stand in cautious action,
where attempts are made anew to anticipate possible differences
between expected and actual outcomes.
149
6.3.2 Virtues of Disjointed Incrementalism for the Individual

The individual policymaker or citizen, trying to foresee and evaluate the
potential consequences of the possible new policies, following Braybrookes formulation, considers the following:
P eremptory values: These are sometimes deal breakers; more generally, they establish constraints on how smaller problems can be broken
out of larger ones or on what policy alternatives will be carried forward. The analyst considers various possible policies in their light, with
the goal of excluding any proposal whose consequences are intolerable
(those that infringe minority rights, those that distribute risk unfairly,
and so forth). The possibility of deadlock must be accepted. Otherwise
it may be believed utilitarianism might be mobilized to argue for overriding minority rights. The task of the collective is to discuss values and
to choose policies whose values are ameliorative, within peremptory
constraints.
R emedial orientation: Because in this approach the analyst will endorse one-step remedies that move in the right direction and are within
the range of acceptable practice, Braybrooke conceives of this as a satisficing or ameliorative and remedial approach rather than an optimizing
approach.
I ncremental alternatives: The single agent can realize a primary
benefit of incrementalism by working on small problems and separable
parts of larger problems, with the purpose of retaining known benefits of
present policy and alleviating known problems. Small moves constitute
a form of probing the environment to test its reactions to dosage. On
the other hand, if a major change is wanted, it will be brought about in
stages by a series of smaller moves, each phase preceded by a fresh-eyed
evaluative phase.
I nstitutional insurance: A single agent can assess whether current
institutions have the capacity to correct for a mistake made within the
framework under construction. If security is not assured, the analyst can
look again at institutional features, or simply not recommend the proposed move. A manageable policy move is defined by the fact that the
institution or organization(s) of primary interest has or have the ability
to reverse the move and undo the harm. Braybrooke notes that the ca-
150
pacity to remedy the consequences of moves seen in hindsight to have

failed is definitional of an adequate political organization. Overall,
even where insurance is ample, small-scale innovations are obviously
more intelligible and easier to absorb and correct. To bring about a new
state of affairs in a major social institution such as health care, for example, many nested series of moves, decoupled to the extent possible, and
alert to necessary coupling, will allow the insurer to monitor change,
while reviewing the rate at which insurance is being depleted.
R edesigning, supersession: These are the mechanisms of option
refinement. Although a single policymaking agent will be less rich in
ideas than a group, single agents do hit on ideas that bring efficiency
gains, and they can identify workable compromises; they redesign. A
second mechanism is supersession of values. Braybrooke uses the term
to cover situations where events outrun a policy framework, inciting
goal revision. His example is that metered parking may have been
introduced to give visitors fairer and faster access to services and shops.
But, once in place, metered parking might noticeably reduce the number
of private vehicles entering the city centre. Metered parking is then seen
as a tool to reduce congestion. Supersession as a mental event is or
should be familiar to all of us. The word identifies a useful opportunity
for re-imagining ones area of interest that we often call rationalization.
Analysts can likewise experience perspective-shifting insights on causal
mechanisms and results within even well-established policies.
6.3.3 Virtues of Disjointed Incrementalism in a Social Process
The social processes of discussion, evaluation, and choice are where
Braybrookes strategy is best fulfilled. Needs will, in the first stage, and
only in part, take the place of the greatest happiness principle, of traditional utilitarianism. (Once needs have been met, people can move into
more abstract deliberations, based in preferences, or additional comforts can be deliberated.) All features of the strategy applicable to the
individual are carried over to the collectivity: peremptory values; remedial orientation; incremental alternatives; institutional insurance; and
redesigning and supersession.
151
In addition, there are other benefits that arise from situating the strategy in a collectivity. Most are part of the shift itself. The traditional
ethical-theory focus on the single agent is superseded. In the place of
the single agent, one finds, more fittingly in social and political life, a
multiplicity of actors with roles and information, and communal discussion and negotiation.
Just as the criterion of need guides means and ends for the substance
of policy decisions, the spirit of the constituting rules of the overarching
system is protected by respect. Participants in ordinary political activity
should not exploit by stealth constitutive features of the political settlement.16
Recommended features for collective policy discussions include:
P artisanship and fragmentation: Fragmentation in the body politic
becomes an advantage for bringing forward information and alternatives. First, under the strategy, the community makes use of what Braybrooke calls the revisionary process (the various levels of evaluative
deliberation available) to generate richness for future redesign phases.
The collective will work on a problem until it is as intelligible as possible, design rules, and devise institutional insurance.
With many groups at work, the stimulation could lead groups to vigorous analysis of different policies. Such constructive competitiveness
would uncover bias. And bias itself contains information about fears
and desires. Many analysts, deliberating, will also be alert to supersession, as discussed above.
F ixing jurisdictions: Subsidiarity suggests the approach. The jurisdiction that is closest to the manifested problem and has the authority
to address it will be the focus for group contributions. Ideally, the authority will implement public policy changes and take responsibility for
the prudential considerations and consequences, any program of action
taking place through many iterations. Thus the formal or state jurisdictions, including legislatures and their committees, will, as now, be the
agent of change drawing from public resources. But voluntary associ16 In developed democracies, intense partisanship is a considerable danger to institutional performance. For an argument that actions that evade the deliberative phases of judgment constitute
a moral offence against the collectivity, see (Thompson (1993)). For an extended application to
other cases of Thompsons formulation, see (Sutherland, S. L. (1995)).
152
ations and private organizations will want continuously to evaluate and

to press for further movement as it becomes intelligibly feasible, and
as they see that institutional insurance is likewise affordable and feasible. Citizens and associations will make use of all their opportunities to
engage with the authorities.
Any received jurisdictions powers and responsibilities can be challenged and shaken by events beyond its control. But Braybrooke does
not foresee a great deal of evolutionary reshuffling of powers and duties
horizontally and vertically. He believes that old societies with stable
working constitutions will by and large continue to work with their received jurisdictions. To be sure, the existing dispensation can well continue to ignore interests not organized into the discussion. Here again
Braybrooke signals his intention to press needs as guides to priorities
for collectives.
6.3.4
Braybrookes Cautions
One would expect that, in a process designed with both individual rights
and group welfare in mind, there would be a good number of cautions.
Centrally, some interests will be ignored or given a low priority. The
dangers of passionate contention are also real. I nstitutionalized interests are vigorously promoted to the public. As well, partisan misrepresentation of policies may capture popular understanding, blocking change that could almost incontestably increase the welfare of most
people. The certainty of realization of desired outcomes is always in
doubt. The only comfort is that, on the basis of previous experience,
there is a good probability that a change that comes through such a process will help to meet needs. But a probability is just that. Institutional
insurance might also fail. Braybrooke insists that the capacity of a political organization to produce remedies for its own failed policy, one
it undertook and insured, is one of the tests of an adequate political
organizationindeed, of an adequate social organization of any kind
(Braybrooke (2004), 60-1).
Braybrooke identifies clusters of situations in which the open process of incrementalism cannot be successful: when there is a factually
or perceived overwhelming external threat; when an initially promis-
6.4. POLICY APPLICATIONS COMPARED
153
ing path leads to decremental change (see below on bovine spongiform

encephalopathy); when social contestation becomes so intense that participation and the open process is itself impeded; when there is a sudden perception of explosive issues in what had seemed anodyne to others; when there are irreconcilable differences about whether a change
is incremental or non-incremental; and, in some cases, when a nonincremental policy may work better than the incremental strategy.
Nevertheless, Braybrooke believes that continuous work in open processes by social groups and political institutions will, overall, produce
enough consensus, richness, and redundancy to reduce the potential of
missing a factor that could lead to disaster. If consequences are signalled
in public processes, there is a better chance that the public jurisdiction
will draw in enough resources for institutional insurance. Therefore the
strategy in its fullest use at the collective level will work better than
other approaches in modestly stable environments.
Just as single agents can salt away resources to buy future freedom of
action, so can communities and agents acting for them behave prudently.
The tools are now familiar: retreat, redesign, or reconceive the problem
for a higher jurisdiction with more resources.
6.4
Policy Applications Compared
One of the shortcomings of people as political animals is that public

policy successes seem to us to be only normal; we do not reflect that
these are the result of careful planning and are maintained by steady coordination and superior vigilance. On the other hand, most of us readily
attribute blame when policy is unexpectedly costly or when it fails decisively.
One can find successful policy reforms, and in exactly the kind
of problem areas that Braybrooke has long thought should most easily yield to incrementalist approaches. In 1974 he published his book
on traffic congestion in London, Traffic Congestion Goes through the
Issue Machine, whose focus is the serial nature of a conversation, a
substance-laden debate among the members of a stable discussion network. Braybrooke has continued to use traffic problems as illustrations
154
of difficulties that invite incrementalist experimentation.

In February 2003, the Greater London Authority, whose predecessor
government had been abolished fourteen years earlier by Prime Minister
Thatcher, introduced the worlds first traffic congestion charge on individual vehicles entering a charging zone covering 22 square kilometres
in central London. The mayor had taken up a proposal that was already
seen to be an option in 1969, but was set aside, as Braybrooke recounts
in Traffic Congestion. The 2003 implementation has many features of a
collective deliberation and series of decisions, as will be seen. Preparations were made for the commuter fee to be paid by telephone, on the
Internet, or at some shops and gas stations. Cameras at key intersections filmed the stream of traffic, and car owners who had not paid the
fee were mailed penalty charge notices. A six-month review by the London Transport Authority said that the charge had stopped about 50,000
drivers from entering the congestion zone each day, for a reduction of
about 16 per cent. The drop in cars reduced the number of traffic jams
by a third and accidents by a fifth. Deterred drivers switched to public transport or skirted the zone. It is estimated that road journey times
were between 10 and 15 per cent faster.
In both administrative and political insurance perspectives, the road
charge is thoroughly incrementalist from the Braybrooke perspective.
For a factor of interest to political analysts, the policy is led by a protagonist whose personal political insurance is good. The new and former
mayor, Ken Livingstone, has never owned a car, and, as mayor, he refuses official cars and takes the underground to work (Finnegan (2004)).
The innovation itself has many substantial insurance features.17 First,
the road charging policy is the centrepiece of decoupled but enabling
initiatives in other areas. For only two examples, bus services were
improved notably before the charge was applied, and other initiatives
improved safety and movement flow for two-wheelers and pedestrians.
To allow for the publics typical slowness to absorb official information, a call centre that could respond to hundreds of thousands of calls
17 Information for this summary is taken from Transport for Londons Press Centre. The full
report Six Months On is available at www.tfl.gov.uk/tfl/cc-intro.shtml. See also
Mayor of London (2002).
155
a week was established. Another salient point is that the charge does
not affect those living in Londonthat is, the voting basebut it does
affect people who were adding to the congestion but paying their property taxes elsewhere. Because almost 90 per cent of people coming into
Londons congestion zone already travelled by public transport, reducing car traffic by less than a fifth affects only a small proportion of the
total commuter flow (although a sizable portion of drivers). Thus the
vast majority of people felt the road charge was reasonable. Once this
had been ascertained, it could be anticipated that any appetite for protest
would be manageable.
The close involvement of affected communities in decision-making
and planning for evaluation is also incrementalist. The business community, which experienced sales losses, was engaged in what might
be called supersession activity, helping to work out the overall impact
by including benefits, such as lower costs to them for goods transport
through the congestion zone.
The Authoritys evaluation of its initiative has been continuous, bulletins being indicator-based and issued regularly. Scrutiny of the implementation has aimed at continual squeezing all the error out of the
system (Men (2003), 2). One can see that the insurance calculations
before implementation have worked out: at six months in, only 110 persistent non-payers have had their cars impounded. Even outsourcing
provided opportunities to show firmness in evaluation. The company
hired by the Greater London Authority to implement and administer the
policy failed its targets in some respects (targeted revenue was bled
by the unanticipated heavy compliance). Stringent penalties were applied in contract renegotiation and were well publicized. In the first
six months of operation, compliance with fees increased strongly, payment rates for penalty charge notices increased, calls for information
dropped from 167,000 per week in the first weeks of operation to 70,000
a week, and the penalized publics use of the appeal system dropped
from more than half of all those who received fines to 16 per cent. After
six months, people were being educated and were mostly reconciled.
Transport for Londons 2005 document Central London Congestion Charging Scheme Impacts Monitoring Summary Review: January
156
2005 covers the period between the previous review and the autumn
of 2004. Overall, traffic levels in 2004 were very similar to the period
immediately following the introduction of charging, when the numbers
of cars entering the charging zone during charging hours plummeted,
with most of the displaced commuters moving to the bus service, for a
total increase in bus patronage of close to 50 per cent from 2002 to late
2004. The average reduction in congestion remains at 30 per cent, with
reduction in delays for peak-hour car journeys still significantly reduced
(compared with the night travel rate). Road traffic accidents have been
reduced somewhat further over the gains registered in the year 2002-3.
Journey times for buses improved, with a further 15 per cent reduction
in 2004 on the indicator, excess waiting time over the 24 per cent reduction achieved in 2003. The enforcement process in 2004 resulted in still
further increases in compliance and payments, and in reduced numbers
of appeals over the previous period. Interestingly, the Authority continued to press through 2004 for improvements in call centre performance
and enhancements to the options for payment of the charge. A survey
in the period found that more than 80 per cent of those who used the
system were now satisfied with the service, although the media report
some sentiment that the initiative involves too much revenue-seeking.
Another incremental policy with several related but decoupled facets
was initiated in France in late 2002 to reduce deaths and injuries on
roads. The president of France, elected in May of that year, had signalled his determination to reduce road deaths throughout France. The
government established an inter-ministerial committee, assisted by a
planning and policy secretariat made up of members with a significant
interest in road security. In February 2003, a bill was presented to Parliament that envisioned three main semi-independent initiatives aimed
at the same goal: steeply increased penalties for road offences, particularly for repeat offenders; an automatic system for identifying and
fining driving offenders; and a general and evolving reinforcement of
severe prevention strategies. At the end of February, the government
announced that judges would be given the authority to double the current penalty in aggravating circumstances. Drunk driving and reckless
157
speeding would be punished by imprisonment for as long as ten years.18

As the reforms took hold, the prime minister revised and improved the
policy with the collaboration of lower-level jurisdictions.
The most stunning impact was made by photo radar. With its implementation at the end of October 2003, a fixed and fully automatic fine of
90 Euros for speeding was implemented. The flat fine is supplemented
by a heavily graduated points system that gives drivers demerits proportional to their excess speed. Evaluating the initiative after two months,
Le Monde (Le Monde (2003), 6) reported that the French, who habitually drove at speeds of 130 kilometres per hour on even the busiest
routes, had lowered their speed by an average of 10 kilometres per hour
per driver. The results were a 25 per cent reduction in road deaths and
20 per cent fewer accidents and injuries. The greatest decrease month
over month was in high-speed driving, defined as a minimum of 50 kilometres per hour over the limit. The following year, 2004, saw a further
10 per cent decrease in deaths; the incidence of speeding at more than
10 kilometres per hour over the limit also dropped, more than 15 per
cent from the 2003 figures (Le Monde (2004a), 8). Also in 2004, an
accidentologue, a specialist in the study of accidents, described the
reduction in deaths over the two years as prodigious and as having resulted from the exertion of steady and varied pressures on drivers. The
expert had never seen the state succeed in such a complex task (Got
(2004), 8).
Some aspects of the first phase of implementation were not as effective as they could have been. For example, the telephone information service intended to familiarize the national driving public with the
photo radar system was implemented with a mere five operators. This
almost negligible educational effort made for initial public confusion
and disaffection, and of course means that initial call volumes cannot
be compared with later volumes to yield information for use in future
changes.19 Nor did the first year of the measures decrease deaths to the
level in Great Britain: in 2003, estimated road deaths in France were
18 www.premier-minstre.gouv.fr
(2002)). See also the French site, www.zeroaccident.
net.
19 Le
Monde (2003), 6, and Gaetner (2003).
158
6,000 compared with about half that in Britain, whose road density is
very similar. (The further reduction of 2004 does however bring France
closer to the British figures.) And French politicians are taking positions
on the radars that reflect their constituents impatience over the limitation of freedom, the severity of the fines, and the apparent lack of any
margin in speed before a fine is levied, such that some fine-payers characterize the income aspect as a racket (Le Monde (2004b), 8). Thus the
policys gains require steady discussion and marginal adjustments. But
over time it becomes clearer to all that it would be next to impossible
for policymakers and politicians to insure against the resulting certain
loss of life that removing the radars would cause. In other words, the
policy has succeeded because the public understands it and wants it and
it lowers the death rate.
I ncremental policies are more often accumulated over time in public
organizations, than they are politically led, intricate, multi-stage initiatives such as the two described above. Each of the two examples depends on a complicit if not convinced public, although the two reforms
are both attractive and good examples of incrementalist policy. Speaking generally, it is difficult for officials to incite politicians to launch and
lead full-scale reviews of accumulated policy in areas that seem routine,
are technical, and affect large numbers of the public, because the work
will be detailed and based in legal and management concepts that are
difficult to master. Also, some of these policies are invisible, until something goes wrong. But developments in other technical areas like food
safety make it clear that it could be important for politicians to interest
themselves in accrued policy in apparently settled areas. Who would
have anticipated, for example, that an established policy of feeding animal waste to ruminants (in this case, cattle), in operation in Britain since
1926, would have become consequential for humans more than half a
century later, when temperatures for rendering animal waste into fertilizer and animal food (an almost unregulated activity within the industry)
were lowered to save fuel? A single decrement, the lowered temperature that did not kill a particular organism, eventually led to the form
of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) that is able to move from
meals to humans. Unfortunately BSE is now an all-too-familiar exam-
159
ple of dramatic policy disaster brought about by apparently incremental

shifts in practice that are now seen to be pivotal decrements.
Political leaders are more likely to try for a dramatically comprehensive policy accomplishment than to work in near invisibility to understand and improve accumulated policy. Politicians prefer a full-scale
analysis and decision followed by a decisive act to move from a wellspecified initial state or unsolved problem to a well-specified final state
or the solved problem (Connolly (1980), 37). Because the aim is often to build up a career or party legacy of dramatic accomplishments
that communicate a message of competence and sometimes of ideology, such mega policy is often called, interchangeably, agenda policy and legacy policy. Examples can range from physical projects
like the exploitation of tar sands in northern Alberta, to the construction of the Millennium Dome with its anticipated program of continued
revenue-generating activities in London, England, to paradigm shifts
in established policies, such as privatization of government bodies and
services, the American presidents interest since 2004 in implementing
private accounts for social security provision, or the implementation of
a major symbolic change via the personal community charge or poll
tax in Britain in 1988 under Prime Minister Thatcher.
Political and policy field analysts cluster around these dramatic, politically led policies.20 It is fair to say that they are typically perceived
as failures. Michael Moran (Moran (2001)) covers several families of
policy failures that began as full-scale, drastic plans. As one example
of the failure of a policy intended to be realized in a single pass, the
total cost of the Millennium Dome was projected in the second half of
the 1990s at 200 million and eventually cost more than 700 million for
the physical structure alone. The first projection seemed so unrealistically low that the responsible government accounting officer asked for
a written instruction before he would issue the initial payments to get
construction underway. The early warning was ignored.
Other failures resemble the reverse engineering of a received policy.
One sees a shared world-view between an interest, such as the agricultural industry, and its nominal regulator, the government ministry
20 See
Moran (2001); Hood et al. (1999); Bovens and THart (1996); Hall (1981).
160
responsible, that allows both to perpetuate their construction of reality.

The world-view in itself enforces institutional blindness and thus resistance to put anything into question, with consequences for the public
goods jointly provided. For example, the dramatic failure to prevent
BSE, due to what looked at the time like an inconsequential efficiencyseeking change in rendering temperatures, occurred in such a setting.
Shared monetary interest between regulated industry and the regulator
is enough to ensure their collaboration and disable critics. Intervention
from the top of the political system, brought about by connections, can
even suppress free flows of crucial information and prevent the public
from looking after its own interests. In such silent decremental failures,
the resulting policy catastrophe emerges from the daily routines of an
organization.
Thus, using Simons concepts in the wrong direction, environmental
perversity, often rooted in institutional incentives, carries some factor
forward to disaster. BSE in Britain is one example mentioned by Moran.
BSE is also a worry in Canada. The Alberta Auditor General reported after the first half of 2004 on Canadas testing record. Testing
for BSE in Canada depends on volunteerism. Individual ranchers decide
whether to submit for BSE testing the head of an animal slaughtered on
their landusually a downer, an animal too sick to get up. Obviously,
ranchers also use their personal judgment about whether or not to send
a near downer to a licensed facility, where it could be spotted by inspectors and pulled out of the food chain for BSE testing. But the viability
of ranchers and of the Canadian beef industry clearly depends on the absence of physical evidence of BSE. The dynamics were made apparent
in the fall of 2003, when Alberta Premier Ralph Klein seemed to tell a
meeting of U.S. governors and Western Canadian premiers that ranchers should shoot, shovel and shut up when faced with a potential BSE
cow (Globe and Mail (2003)). Fortunately, the publicity given to Mr.
Kleins remarks, plus the timeliness of the Alberta Auditor Generals
Report at mid-year (Alberta (2004), combined to raise consciousness
and thus compliance. A failure was averted for 2004, but the incentive
system for testing remains worrying.
6.5. CONCLUSION
161
6.5 Conclusion
In a world characterized by under-examined great leaps and received
policy that holds unexamined problems, Braybrookes forward-looking
policy strategy looks helpful and important. He wants to engage more
people in active deliberation on public policy in a style of analysis that
amounts to taking apart mentally and incrementally policy elements that
were often put together in small increments over long periods of time in
the real world. Braybrookes claims are modest: relatively incremental
policies are more democratic in daily practice because they are more
intelligible and therefore more amenable to supervision by those most
affected. They are relatively safe in comparison to policies undertaken
as tightly coupled single pass undertakings and, further, persistent incremental changes in a consistent direction can lead to great change
over time. Incremental policies are closely planned to be reversible, and
contingencies are closely monitored so that damage can be repaired.
The attentiveness to detail in policies planned under incremental strategies becomes more attractive and important as the scale of operations
increases (Braybrooke (1998a), chap. 16), because with detail the probability of a smooth implementation improves. The French approach
to lowering the number of road deaths is a large-scale policy that took
place along with several decoupled but complementary policy innovations, each aspect requiring interventions with individuals. With careful planning for intelligibility, public acceptance is more readily earned
(328). As Bailey and Braybrooke note in their essay on Dahl, frustration with unintelligible policy issues feeds the tendency of politics as a
meaningful activity to vanish from the lives of more and more citizens
(Braybrooke and Bailey (2003), 111).
Over time, the alienation of citizens from the democratic process undermines genuine self-government and autonomy. The loss of peoples
civic faith and activismtheir intelligent support, energy, resources,
goodwill, and insight applied to meeting their own needs and those of
otherscauses incalculable harm to the quality of public life and incurs danger. Still more serious, and under-noticed by client-citizens,
is the fact that the national political space addressable by those whom
162
the vote puts into power is much less than it was. P olitical parties
were, until at least the final third of the twentieth century, reasonably
effective mechanisms for organizing, aggregating, and creating citizen
preferences for fundamental state policies. Now central banks direct
economies in a globalized world. The efficient part of apparatuses that
govern us, to nod to Bageot, has moved beyond national borders, and
economic power is not itself subject to national governments. To quote
Gunter Grass, Parliament is degenerating into a subsidiary of the stock
market.
What is interesting, even in a world with fewer points of access and
influence, is how constructive Braybrookes strategy is. Braybrooke is
clear that people in groups can with effort and intelligence create new
political space around workable ideassolutions that attract the interest
of people whose values differ. Braybrooke would have citizens organize
around a problem without partisanship or fixed interests (the process of
deliberation will identify interests in any case), and proceed by investigation and debate to parse their problem into the smallest possible uncoupled elements until good starting points can be identified and plans
and actions developed. His strategy does not assume that all or even
very many citizens must be mobilized for a reasonable start. Nor does
it assume that issue-oriented groups must have the ear of power from
the beginning. Rather it is more likely that a groups work will attract
those with resources once it is well formulated and workable.
So-called ordinary people accomplish great things when they collaborate. The Canadian prairies, particularly Saskatchewan, had a large
and thriving system of cooperatives in the middle of the twentieth century. Town populations, whose knowledge society consisted of a doctor, a banker, and the school teachers, found in themselves the ability
and persistence to understand commodities markets, run businesses, and
provide leadership to professionals. And they still have it. One sees international renewed interest in health cooperatives, where citizens have
a voice in the priorities of medical clinics and provide feedback to their
practitioners.
Changes in scale, like feelings of impotence, can erode the empathy
citizens feel for one another, reducing potential cooperation. In refer-
6.5. CONCLUSION
163
ence to scale, Braybrooke holds that our local participation, which we

may undervalue, is not to be seen as a first step toward exerting influence in a higher jurisdiction, but rather as a life-long base for our practice of robust civility (Braybrooke and Bailey (2003), 104, coined in
reference to Dahl). Robust civility is a quality that Braybrooke knows
well. He has investigated it in his work and lived it in his capacities as
citizen and colleague. In the 1960s and early 1970s, Braybrooke and
Lindbloms prescription for prudently reversible and intelligible policy
change was often summarily dismissed by so-called progressive intellectuals. It was interpreted as an endorsement of, or an apology for,
the status quo, and therefore as getting in the way of large-scale, comprehensively rational, radical policies. One can hope that Braybrookes
more complete formulation of incrementalism with utilitarianism addressing needs will encourage more citizens to take up tools to chip
away purposefully at public evils.
Chapter 7
Life of Pi and the Existence of

Tigers
S TEVEN B URNS
Abstract
As a tribute to David Braybrookes interest in the arts and his ecumenical
work in philosophy, this essay gives a critical reading of Quebec novelist
Yann Martels Life of Pi. Martel offers in his novel both argument and
illustration of the thesis that, not a principle of parsimony, but a principle
of richness and persuasiveness governs which explanatory entities are to
be given status in an account of the truth. Pi, as an extreme case, is a
believing Christian, Muslim, and Hindu who claims that belief in God
is justified by the excellence of the stories that the religions tell. In this
essay, attention is focused on the existence of Pis tiger companion, which
is both denied and held to be necessary in the story. Even in the face
of contrary evidence, belief in the existence of the tiger is said to be a
prerequisite for appreciating the story at its best. Objections to Martels
best story hypothesis are developed against the background of Anthony
Saviles parsimonious account of best explanation in aesthetics, and an
ontologically more modest reading of Pis story is proposed.
The
first version of this paper was delivered to the Visiting Speaker Series at the University
College of Cape Breton, January 2004. Subsequent versions have been discussed with colleagues
at the Zentrum fr Kanada-Studien at the University of Vienna and at Dalhousie Universitys Philosophy Colloquium. I am indebted to the habitus of the Boys Book Club with whom I first
discussed Martels novel, and I am grateful to many others who have also helped me to make my
story clearer.
165
166
CHAPTER 7. STEVEN BURNS
David Braybrooke surprised me above all by the range of his interests. I

first saw the book he co-authored with Lindblom displayed on the mantel of a colleague.1 I was being welcomed to the Dalhousie department
as a new junior department member. Not noting the authors names, but
being surprised by the sociological cast of their topic, I made a lame
joke about the ubiquity of little red books with practical ambitions (this
was in the 1960s, when Mao Tse-Tungs little red book was on everyones shelf). David was present, and unfazed by my tactlessness. He
was soon introducing me to new string quartets and new colleagues in
other disciplines, to local as well as university politics, to new artists
and novelists, and of course to a wide range of philosophical topics pursued with rigour and enthusiasm. He set a standard of multinational,
multilingual multidisciplinarity that I and my colleagues could barely
recognize let alone emulate. It was he who made it immediately clear
to the new appointees that we were expected to publish, and to get us
started he sent our names and areas of interest to the book review editor
of the Canadian Philosophical Associations journal Dialogue. David
may have led by example, but he was not above shoving from behind at
the same time.
I had adopted from my doctoral supervisor, Peter Winch, the view
that philosophers schematic examples and their logical formalizations
could obscure as well as illuminate philosophical problems. Here is an
example: You are one of two people in a lifeboat that will hold only
one person. Should you jump overboard or push the other person overboard? In matters of ethics and philosophy of mind, Winch held, the
examples described in subtle detail by good novelists were likely to reveal things to the philosophical analyst that were really worth knowing.
I was pleased to find that there was room in Braybrookes vision of philosophy for this rebellious view, and indeed that he was master of the
detailed example himself.2 It is as a tribute to these aspects of his extraordinary influence on a department in which it has been a privilege
and a pleasure to work that I dedicate the following adventure to David
1 Braybrooke
and Lindbloom (1963)

one apt case he relished the details of a real-life example, the lifeboat cannibalism of the
survivors of the shipwrecked Mignonette. See Braybrooke and Fingard (1985)
2 In
167
Braybrooke. It concerns yet another lifeboat adventure, and was first

conceived for a general audience. As a result, it begins with a novel and
sneaks up on the philosophy, rather than the other way around.
There is precedent for this, too, in Braybrookes work. He once
composed a comic piece for the Arts and Sciences Faculty Council of
Dalhousie University, A (Summers) Day in the Life of a Professor of
Philosophy.3 It had the serious aim of indicating that professors of humanities do not take four-month vacations between April and September. It had comic consequences: at its next meeting the Council voted to
have the text removed from the minutes, apparently on the grounds that
some members did go walkabout in the summer and were humiliated
by the comparison with the fictional Professor Greens industriousness.
What I remember enjoying most about the Day in the Life was that by
mid-evening Prof. Green turned to lighter reading, though Braybrooke
was quick to add that even this may have a bearing on his work. It was
in just such a moment that I took up Life of Pi, and it has indeed had
a bearing on my philosophical work. That I have been moved to write
this paper is evidence that David was right yet again.
Dalhousie University has a long tradition of teaching a class on
philosophical ideas in literature. Begun by J. Gould Schurman (who
was professor of English and then professor of philosophy in the 1880s),
the class was made famous by Herbert L. Stewart from the 1920s to the
1940s4 and revived by Robert M. Martin in the 1970s and 1980s. I have
several times been allowed to teach it, and were I to teach it again I
would include Life of Pi, because it is an extraordinary literary experience with ambitious philosophical content.
Yann Martel had a degree in philosophy and two earlier works of
fiction to his credit when Life of Pi brought him international fame.5
3 Braybrooke
(1985) (Editors note: the essay appears in this volume as Appendix A.)
which brilliantly analyzed the writings of Hardy, Meredith, Carlyle, Mrs.
Humphry Ward, H.G. Wells, George Bernard Shaw, and others, was an educational experience
that had few equals in the country, wrote a former student, T.A. Goudge, in Goudge (7 68), (542).
Goudge was by then chair of the department of philosophy at the University of Toronto and had
been invited to write this pioneer essay on the history of Canadian philosophy by none other than
David Braybrooke.
5 Yann Martel, Life of Pi (Toronto: Random House, 2001). The book won the Hugh MacLennan Prize, the 2002 Man Booker Prize, the 2004 German Book Prize, and in 2003 was selected by
4 Stewarts course ...
168
The book has four parts. There is an Authors Note at the beginning,
and other, smaller, authors notes scattered through the text. They are
printed in italics. Up to a point the authors story matches Martels biography, and I shall call him Martel, but the more sophisticated reader
will insist that this author is also a fictional character. The body of the
book is in three parts; it is the story of the life of a person named Pi,
which is short for Piscine Molitor Patel. Part I is called Toronto and
Pondicherry, because Pi grew up in the south of India, in the Frenchcolonial city of Pondicherry, where his father was the zoo-keeper, and
then emigrated to Canada, where he studied at university and now lives
as a middle-aged man with his wife, two children, a dog, and a cat.
As the author says at the end of Part I, This story has a happy ending (103). It is a story that can make your spirit soar. Part II is called
The Pacific Ocean. This is the most famous, and longest, part of the
novel, in which the sixteen-year-old Pi spends more than seven months
in a lifeboat accompanied by a 450-pound Bengal tiger and very nearly
starves to death. It can strike you with terror and make your heart ache.
Part III takes place in the infirmary in Mexico where Pi finally came
to shore after his extraordinary ordeal. It is only thirty pages long, but
it makes your head swim. Together these four sections constitute a remarkably unified novel, made of strikingly diverse parts. I shall begin
at the beginning.
7.1
Authors Note
The authors note tells us two key things. First, he went to India to
work on his next novel. It was to be set in Portugal, but India was a
cheaper place to live, and besides, Thats what fiction is about, isnt it,
the selective transforming of reality? The twisting of it to bring out its
essence? What need did I have to go to Portugal? (vi). That novel was
eventually abandoned. It had many virtues:
Your theme is good, as are your sentences. Your characters are so ruddy with life they practically need birth certifia CBC panel for the Canada Reads national radio program. In what follows, citations by page
number alone are to this edition.
7.1. AUTHORS NOTE
169
cates. The plot ... is grand, simple and gripping. Youve

done your research, gathering the factshistorical, social,
climatic, culinarythat will give your story its feel of authenticity. The dialogue zips along, crackling with tension
... [However] an element is missing, that spark that brings to
life a real story ... Your story is emotionally dead. (vi, vii)
This episode gives us a hint about the importance of fiction and its
nature. It is to deviate from reality in order to show the essence of
reality. As he concludes: If we, citizens, do not support our artists, then
we sacrifice our imagination on the altar of crude reality and we end up
believing in nothing and having worthless dreams (xi). The second key
thing is that he meets in Pondicherry a man who learns that Martel is
a writer. This leads immediately to the familiar phenomenonhave I
got a story for you!and he promises him a story that will make you
believe in God (viii). It is Pis story. Martel then goes to Toronto to
meet Pi, hears his story first-hand, and retells it to us. Clearly this story,
unlike the one that was discarded, will not be a mere description of
crude reality, but will have emotional life. So it does. And it will make
you believe in God. My central question is, how is the story supposed
to make us believe in God, and can we agree that it does?
We may think that the answer is that Pis survival is a miracle. If you
believe that a child can live for seven months in a boat on the open Pacific, hallucinating from starvation and dehydration, and accompanied
by an adult tiger, then you have to believe in divine providence. That
may be what the man believed who told the author about this amazing
story. It is not the point that Martel wants to make. Pi may think that
God was with him on the boat.6 But Pi was a believer before his adventure; it was not the adventure that made him believe or should make us
believe. In fact, I think that Martel has a very different idea in mind, so
I shall propose a much longer answer.
6 Chapter 52 consists of a complete list of the contents of the lifeboat. It ends: 1 boy with a
complete set of light clothing but for one lost shoe / 1 spotted hyena / 1 Bengal tiger / 1 lifeboat /
1 ocean / 1 God (162).
170
7.2
Toronto and Pondicherry
A word about our heros name is in order. His uncle had loved swimming and had studied in Paris. Piscine Molitor was the name of his
favourite swimming pool, so he suggested that name for his nephew.
Piscine Molitor Patels schoolmates, however, found Piscine an odd
name; they teased him and called him Pissing. So one school year,
Piscine renamed himself Piequals 3.14, he added. It stuck. (So,
too, did the association with water and the idea of mathematical science.)
Two important themes are established in the first one hundred pages:
God and nature. Nature takes the form of wild animals. Pi studies both
religion and zoology when he finally gets safely to Canada and attends
university. In fact we first meet him explaining his research on the threetoed sloth. He found its calm and introspective demeanour soothing to
his shattered self. In fact, [s]ometimes I got my majors mixed up ...
[The sloth] reminded me of God (5). Much more instructive is Pis
childhood experience. His father was owner of the Pondicherry Zoo,
and he thought his childhood was paradise on earth (15). He was
wakened by roaring lions in the morning, soothed by the benevolent
gaze of bison and orangutans, and delighted by the brilliant colours of
the birds. In the midst of this Garden of Eden he learned that the most
dangerous animal in a zoo is Man (31). It is not that the great carnivores
are not dangerous; in fact the reader will not quickly forget the scene in
which Pis father takes his sons to watch a live goat being released in the
cage of a hungry Bengal tiger. Tigers are very dangerous, his father
shouted above the snarling of the beast. I want you to remember this
lesson for the rest of your lives (37). Pi later comments: It was enough
to scare the living vegetarian daylights out of me (39).
We are then given a lesson on how humans can create an environment for a wild animal that will allow it to be emotionally stable and
stress-free even in confinement. In these pages of ingenious lore about
zoos and lion-tamers, and about wild animals that are more interested
in comfort and safety than in what we think of as freedom, Martel is
clearly preparing us for Pis great adventure, but we have as yet no idea
7.2. TORONTO AND PONDICHERRY
171
why or how this is going to be relevant. Even less do we know how the
God theme is going to be relevant. When he visits Pi in Toronto, the
author describes his house as a temple. It has shrines to Hindu gods
Shiva, Krishna, Shakti, and Ganesha; it has icons of the crucified Christ
and the Virgin Mary, and it has an Arabic prayer rug next to a veiled
Koran (chapter 15). His university degree in religious studies was not
something that he forgot about after getting his parchment. But this
interest in religion begins in his youth. The young Pi is a kind of religious genius. He is raised a Hindu and loves its sculptured cones of
red kumkum powder and baskets of yellow turmeric nuggets; he feels
at home in its rites and rituals, and the universe makes sense to [him]
through Hindu eyes (53). There is a moving lecture on this. We are
introduced to the concept of Brahman nirguna, the original oneness,
without qualities, beyond understanding and beyond language. There
follows Brahman saguna, with qualities, with moral attributes and taking the forms of the distinguishable gods mentioned above. But Brahman is also atman, the breath of the spirit within each of us, a pilgrim
spirit which seeks to find its karma, to be at one with the Absolute.
Pi is a well-content Hindu when at fourteen he encounters Jesus
Christ. In his community Christians have a reputation for few gods
and great violence (56), but he meets a kind priest who teaches him
the extraordinary story of a God who became a humble human, was humiliated, and put to death. Imagine, thinks Pi, if my father had said to
me,
Piscine, the lions are killing the other animals in the zoo.
The situation has become intolerable. Something must be
done. I have decided that the only way the lions can atone for
their sins is if I feed you to them. Yes, Father, that would
be the right and logical thing to do. Give me a moment to
wash up. (58)
What a weird story. Pi asks for a different story, but finds that the
Christians only have the one Story; it is about love and humility. So Pi
finds himself haunted by this new god and becomes a Christian.
172
Islam had a reputation worse than Christianitysfewer gods, greater violence (64), but a year later, at fifteen, Pi meets a Muslim teacher
whose humble friendship leads him to discover the postures of Islamic
prayer, the ritual recitation of the ninety-nine names of God, the soothing beauty of a religion of brotherhood and devotion (67). Pi has not,
however, abandoned Hinduism or turned his back on Christianity. He
believes all three. He is in love with God. I was a practising Hindu,
Christian and Muslim (71). Of course he is attacked by the representatives of all three faiths; you can only be one of those, they say; the
others are heresies or superstitions! But the youngster quotes Mahatma
Ghandi: All religions are true. I just want to love God (76). And so
he does.
It is not at this point clear what this aspect of Pis character has to
do with his great adventure. It is not obviously his faith in God that gets
him through his ordeal on the Pacific. Nor is it clear what his survival
adventure has to do with his faith. He believed in the Divinity of all
three religions before he left India for Canada. So Martel has created a
vivid character as a comment on our relation to nature on the one hand,
and our relation to the spirit of religion on the other, but has given us few
clues about how this is to relate to the story that will make us believe in
God.
There is one minor theme in Part I that should be mentioned. Recall
the authors opening remarks about fiction, the story that transforms
reality, and his warning that we should not sacrifice our imagination on
the altar of crude reality or we will end up believing in nothing. That
theme is given some new words by the adult Pi as he retells his story.
Dry, yeastless factuality is one phrase. The better story is another
(70). The two phrases appear in what we might consider an argument in
favour of believing in God. Imagine an agnostics last words as he slips
from life: if he stays true to his reasonable self, if he stays beholden to
dry, yeastless factuality, he might try to explain the warm light bathing
him by saying, Possibly a f-f-failing oxygenation of the b-b-brain,
and, to the very end, lack imagination and miss the better story (70).
7.3. A DIGRESSION ON BELIEF
173
7.3 A Digression on Belief

A philosopher cannot read about Pis belief in these varied gods without
recoiling. It is bad enough to believe in any unprovable entity, but to believe in three incompatible ones is intolerable. Yet Pi is a wonderfully
believable character. How is this? What does logic tell us about belief?
That one cannot believe both p and not-p in the same way and at the
same time; that is a contradiction. But this tells us precious little. The
dialecticians will ask, What is not-p? and answer, Anything but p.
So if p = god exists then roses are in leaf outside my window is an
instance of not-p; and one can easily believe in both p and not-p. That
is not the point! By in the same way we meant that one cannot believe
both that God exists and that God does not exist. Or should that be:
It is true that God exists and it is not true that God exists? Better
still, is the problem not this: that one cannot both believe that God exists and not believe that God exists? I am skipping past distinctions of
great logical import, but in any case it can be argued that belief comes
in degrees. This fact should show that to claim that there are no options
other than to believe p or disbelieve p is an irresponsible simplification
of the mental life. I can believe in p a little bit or a lot. No doubt I
can at the same time and in the same way believe not-p. Surely this is
what most of our minds are like most of the time. Philosophers, however, insist on preserving the original insight that it is a contradiction,
an impossibility, both to believe and not believe the same thing in the
same way at the same time. So they write: Those who prefer to think
in terms of degree of belief should read such expressions as S believes
that p as shorthand for S believes that p to a degree greater than 0.5
(on a scale from 0 to 1).7 Does this really help? If it was implausible
that one both believe p and not-believe p, is it equally implausible that
one be 0.51 certain of p and 0.51 certain of not-p (or 0.51 uncertain of
p)? Surely maintaining that this is a flat contradiction belies our real
inner lives. Only a Divine Knower could parse our beliefs that finely!
And we are doing epistemology, not theology.
If an account that allows for degrees of belief makes matters more
7 Mele
(2001), 10.
174
complex, consider what happens when we allow that some people are
more capable of believing than others. Some people have big hearts
there are scarcely limits to how much they can love, and those close to
them might well wish that they love less smotheringly. Others may love
as much as they can, and one might wish that they could have loved
more. So it is with the capacity for belief. On an Aristotelian scale,
those deficient in belief go through life as sceptics or ironists, while
those with an excess of the capacity are as it were gluttons of belief. Pi
seems to be a belief glutton. I think that if he believed 0.51 p, he would
believe p a great deal more than would an ironist who believed 0.51 p.
These are two different scales of degrees of belief.
Let us construct a paradox: Pi is undecided about something, q; he
believes 0.5 q and 0.5 not-q. An ironist, let us say, believes only half
as hard as Pi. If she believed 100 per cent q she would be in the same
psychological state as Pi with regard to q. She is capable of that. She is
also capable of 100 per cent disbelief that q. Now if she were in exactly
the state that Pi is in, she would not be undecided, as he is, but would
be believing 1.0 q and disbelieving 1.0 q. That is plainly a problem,
indeed approaching absurdity. Yet the state is possible, because Pi is in
it. Perhaps an Aristotelian prescription for this muddle would be apt.
A virtuous believer would be one who sought the mean between these
extremes, who believed p to a degree supported by the evidence for p,
but no more than that. She would be neither a belief-ascetic nor a beliefglutton, but a moderate or virtuous believer. Aristotle, of course, wisely
warns us not to treat the mean as a mathematical point, and says that we
should expect no more precision in such matters than is appropriate.8
Nonetheless, on this sort of account we might conclude that Pi is not
a virtuous character; he believes much too much, too freely, and too
heartily; but of course we should not doubt that he is possible.
8 See, for instance, Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, I:3. See also II:7, on truthfulness as a
mean, and III:9, where after a long discussion of courage he concludes that from this we can form
at best a rough conception of its nature (1117b).
7.4. THE TIGER IN THE LIFEBOAT
175
7.4 The Tiger in the Lifeboat

In the second part of Pis story, titled The Pacific, we have the heart
of the novel. The ship carrying Pi and his family and the familys zoo
animals to Canada suffers an unexplained explosion and sinks in rough
wind and water in about twenty minutes. I shall be very sketchy about
this story, for it contains much magic that I do not want to spoil. Pi finds
zoo animals thundering about the deck.9 Some crewmen throw him into
a lifeboat towards which he sees a favourite tiger desperately swimming.
The tiger is named Richard Parker because of a clerical error, but that
is an anecdote which I shall leave for the reader to enjoy. Suffice it to
say, this character effectively does have a birth certificate.10 Pi throws
him a lifebuoy and he climbs in the boat before Pi realizes how stupid
he has been. He also finds in the boat a zebra, which has broken its leg
jumping in, and a spotted hyena. Then an orangutan floating on a bale
of bananas reaches them. So he is in a lifeboat with four dangerous,
wild animals!
Over the course of the next while, as the storm abates and beautiful
sunrises break the darkness of the nights, the animals hold the stage.
The hyena, vividly described, begins to eat the injured zebra. Then
it fights the orangutan and kills her. Pi is about to defend himself by
attacking the hyena when the tiger, who has been under a tarpaulin,
reappears. Pi flees to a tiny raft that is dragging behind the boat. The
tiger takes care of the hyena.
By now Pi has found the stock of water and food in the lifeboat. He
regains his spirits and then figures out how to train the tiger to recognize
a division of territory.11 For instance, he uses a lifebuoy whistle as a
9 I clearly heard monkeys shrieking. Something was shaking the deck. A gauran Indian
wild oxexploded out of the rain and thundered by me, terrified, out of control, berserk. I looked
at it, dumbstruck and amazed. Who in Gods name had let it out? (115).
10 I am referring here to the pedigree within the novel. Martel has explained that he chose
the tigers name because of several external coincidences. The cabin boy who was killed and
eaten by the survivors of the Mignonette in 1884 was named Richard Parker (see note 2, above).
Remarkably, so was the man eaten by the survivors of a fictional shipwreck in Edgar Allen
Poes only novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, written nearly fifty years earlier, in
1837. See http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/feature/-/309590/ (accessed 27 December 2004).
11 See especially the detailed instructions for establishing dominance over a wild animal in
176
sort of whip. He even marks his end of the boat with his urine. The
tiger eventually settles into his comfort zone at the other end of the
boat. And so they travel. Pi catches fish and turtles, and feeds Richard
Parker. He figures out the water treatment equipment, and keeps them
in a minimum of fresh water. Eventually, It was Richard Parker who
calmed me down. It is the irony of this story that the one who scared me
witless to start with was the very same who brought me peace, purpose,
I dare say even wholeness (179). When a school of flying fish, who are
in turn being hunted by predators, fly over and into the boat,
Richard Parker ... raised himself and went about blocking,
swiping and biting all the fish he could. Many were eaten
live and whole, struggling wings beating in his mouth. It
was a dazzling display of might and speed. Actually, it was
not so much the speed that was impressive as the pure animal confidence, the total absorption in the moment. Such a
mix of ease and concentration, such a being-in-the-present,
would be the envy of the highest yogis. (201)
They develop routines. There are the inevitable sharks, some huge
storms (chapter 83!), a ship that steams by without seeing them (chapter
86), cycles of boredom and terror, elation and despair. But scarcity of
food and water eventually wears them down. They seem about to die.
The tiger, gaunt and barely panting, lies in the bottom of the boat. Pi
goes blind, begins to hallucinate. There is a conversation with another
lifeboat that seems to be imaginary.
Then the most wonderful delirium takes over. Pi sees an island,
an island of floating algae, with trees growing out of pure vegetation
(285). There is edible seaweed, pools of fresh water, and marvellous
inhabitants, the gentle, sociable meerkat. This story, with its rejoicing
and rejuvenation, its secret dangers and surprises, has to be read to be
believed. It is an astonishing tour de force, a chapter of thirty pages in
a book whose other chapters average three pages each. Within another
page their boat is washed up on the shores of Mexico. Richard Parker
jumps right over Pi.
chapter 71.
7.5. OCKHAMS RAZOR
177
I saw his body, so immeasurably vital, stretched in the air

above me, a fleeting, furred rainbow. He landed in the water, his back legs splayed, his tail high, and from there, in
a few hops, he reached the beach. He went to the left, his
paws gouging the wet sand, but changed his mind and spun
around. He passed directly in front of me on his way to the
right. He didnt look at me. He ran a hundred yards or so
along the shore before turning in ... [He] looked fixedly into
the jungle. Then Richard Parker, companion of my torment,
awful, fierce thing that kept me alive, moved forward and
disappeared forever from my life. (315-16)
7.5
Ockhams Razor
Here we must introduce another philosophical theme. Ever since Plato

there has been a debate about whether going beyond yeastless factuality
can be justified. In Parmenides Plato criticizes himself for trying in his
earlier dialogues to explain the phenomena of the world in terms of his
theory of Forms.12 There are enough things in the world already without
postulating an unchanging Form for every quality or distinction that we
see among phenomena. That just adds a multitude of new things to the
universe that need explaining themselves. Worse, he adds arguments
to show that there are not just many new things, but infinitely many of
them! And if that were not enough, he tries to show that even if they did
exist they would be so disconnected from the world of apparent things
that they could not explain them anyway. It is as if he invented the
slogan, Do not multiply entities needlessly.
That is the principle known as Ockhams razor.13 Ockham posed an
12 More properly, Plato portrays an elderly Parmenides criticizing a young Socrates for holding
these views.
13 William of Ockham is arguably the greatest philosopher England has produced. He was at
least the greatest philosopher of his century (c. 1285-1349). He studied and taught at Oxford in
the 1310s, spent four years in Avignon in the 1320s being examined for heresy by agencies of
Pope John XII, and lived in the court of the Emperor Louis of Bavaria in the 1330s and 40s, where
he defended the divine right of kings against the traditional view that only the Pope had a divine
right to power and that kings got their power from the Pope. He is believed to have died in 1349
of the black plague.
178
enormous challenge to the philosophy of his time. Its central characteristic is known as realism. Realism is a peculiar term in philosophy.
In ordinary language we know that it means roughly this: the world
around us is real, we can grasp it with our minds, the world that we are
conscious of is not a figment of our imaginations, it is not dependent
on our minds at all. It is there whether we think of it or not. Reality is
independent of our ideas of it. When philosophers speak of realism in
connection with the Middle Ages, however, they mean something quite
different. They mean that Platonic Ideas are real. This has its roots
in Platos teaching that the Forms are the reality of which the empirical world is just the appearance. Forms are the stable and knowable
objects of the intellect. What we perceive through the senses is constantly changing; they are objects of belief, but never of knowledge. By
Ockhams time the doctrine was that
the human intellect discovers in the particulars apprehended
by sense experience an intelligible order of abstract essences
and necessary relations [which are] ontologically prior to
particular things and contingent events and that from this
order the intellect can demonstrate necessary truths concerning first causes and the being and attributes of God.14
Ockham rejected this realism, maintaining that our knowledge is
based on direct experience of particular things and events, not on grasping an intelligible essence. He was realist in the ordinary sense, for he
thought that the world is real and that we can have knowledge of it, but
he was a nominalist in the medieval sense. He thought that the separate
forms or essences are not real. The names we give them are just that,
names (nomina), words that do not stand for real entities.
The name Ockhams razor is given to a principle that Ockham did
not invent but often used. It is often called the principle of parsimony,15
and is usually given as Do not multiply entities needlessly. Ockham
14 William of Ockham, Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Paul Edwards (London: CollierMacmillan, 1967), 8: 307
15 Probably first found in Aristotle, Physics I:4, 188a, 17-18: it is better to assume a smaller
and finite number of principles.
7.5. OCKHAMS RAZOR
179
likely did not use exactly this formulation,16 for the good reason that
it seems to imply an ontological interpretationthat a logical principle can lead us to conclusions about the existence or non-existence of
thingsbut he frequently used near neighbours: Plurality is not to be
assumed without necessity and What can be done with fewer assumptions is done in vain with more. These slogans are intended to mean
that if you have some things to explain, and two possible explanations
of them, the one that requires fewer extra principles, or which is simpler,
is the better explanation, the one more likely to be true.
What makes a story simple? Compare what makes an explanatory
system simple. Leibniz thought that this is the best of all possible worlds
because God chose, among all those possible worlds, the one that had
the greatest variety of phenomena with the least number of laws. Imagine a world in which when you drop a pencil it falls most of the time.
The other times it rises, or floats, or dances a jig. That would be a world
with more phenomena, more odd things happening, but much more
complicated natural lawsgravity would be overruled by who knows
what other varied explanatory principles. (Imagine a world in which the
human female had her teats where a cow does, or in which the human
male had his penis where a pig has its tail. That would certainly be odd
enough. I suppose that the missionary position would cease to be a preferred form of reproductive activity. That would be sad, since having
sex face to face is one of the things that makes humans a more loving
species, but perhaps we could get used to it. But what if some men had
theirs rear-mounted and others forward; or if some women had theirs up
and others down? That would not only be a world with weird standards
of beauty, but one in which biology was an even weirder science; either
the laws of genetics would vary inexplicably, sometimes producing one
type and sometimes the other, or else they would be more complicated
in ways I shall leave the reader to imagine.)
On the other hand, Leibniz thought that if there were fewer explanatory principlesfor example, that all bodies seek rest and there is no
principle of inertia to keep motion goingthen soon all motion would
cease. That would be a world with vastly less variety of phenomena. So,
16 As
a Dalhousie student once argued. See Schlosser (1983).
180
he thought: this actual world is the one chosen by the creator because it
is the best solution to the problem of how to get the greatest variety of
phenomena with the simplest explanatory principles.
Ockham and Leibniz, of course, used God as a first principle. They
did not intend that Ockhams razor be used against the idea of a creator,
let alone to reduce the number of entities in the universe by one, but
in fact that is what has happened. The modern world discovered that
it did not need God as a hypothesis to explain what could be explained
more simply by natural science. So the principle of parsimony is used to
adjudicate between competing scientific theories: given equal predictive
power, the theory with simpler laws or presuppositions is the better one;
and it is used to show that we do not need the concepts of Platonic Form,
soul, or God, any more than we need the concepts of phlogiston or aura.
Adding God to our explanatory system does not help to explain anything
more than what we can explain by other meansit just indicates that we
have not discovered the explanation yet. So, to put it in the familiar (if
perhaps mistaken) ontological form, God is an extra item in the list of
things in the universe, one that is not necessary, and we should not
multiply entities beyond necessity.
It is in this spirit that Anthony Savile wrote his account of best explanation in aesthetics.17 His main aim in this paper is to explain the place
of the artists intention in appreciating a work of art. His conclusions
are that so far as determining the full basic text of the work is concerned
the artist has the last word, but so far as determining the correct reading
of the text is concerned the artist only has the first word.18 The idea that
there is a correct reading of a work of art is of course controversial,
but invariably some readings are better than others, and typically one is
better than all the others. We can call it the best available reading and
use this as a gloss on correct. This view, that the artist does not have
the last word about what is the correct understanding of his or her work,
requires Savile to provide an account of how such a judgment is to be
justified. His idea, borrowed from Wittgenstein, is that judgments in a
17 Anthony Savile, The Place of Intention in the Concept of Art, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 69, n.s. (1968-9). I shall refer to it as reprinted in Harold Osborne, ed., Aesthetics
(Oxford University Press, 1972), 158-76.
18 Ibid., 164.
7.5. OCKHAMS RAZOR
181
court of law can provide a useful model.19 When a sentence in a contract needs to be interpreted by a court, the signatories intentions are
not decisive; they are what is at issue. What the court tries to determine
is what the sentence in its contractual context means, what the correct
reading of it is. Here Savile writes:
The closest I have been able to come to finding an account
which meets these various demands is to say that the objective meaning of a string of words uttered in a given context
is given by that reading of those words which (a) accounts
for the presence in that string of as many relevant features
of that string as possible and in the best of cases accounts
for all of them; (b) which is as simple as any other equally
complete reading; (c) which gives as unitary an account as
possible of that string; and (d) which makes the production
of the string appropriate in the intersubjectively identifiable
circumstances of its utterance.20
The correct reading of a work of art, that is, is the one that accounts
for the greatest number of relevant features of the work, while being
as simple and unitary and appropriate as the competing readings. This
gives for aesthetic judgment a set of principles very much like the razor.
If you are trying to account for the greatest number and variety of phenomena with the most parsimonious set of principles possible, then you
are trying not to multiply entities beyond necessity.
There are problems with such an account. I shall not pursue them
here, but it should be mentioned that Savile gives us no guidance about
how to choose between two readings of equal explanatory power, one
of which is simpler and the other more appropriate or unified. Nor does
he explain why we should prefer a reading that accounts for a few more
relevant details but is much less simple and unified, to one of much
greater elegance but slightly less explanatory power. Nonetheless, he is
clearly in the tradition of Ockham and Leibniz. The best reading of a
19 See G.E. Moore, Wittgensteins Lectures in 1930-33, in Philosophical Papers (London:
George Allen and Unwin, 1959), 315.
20 Savile, The Place of Intention in the Concept of Art, 169-70.
182
work of art will not multiply entities needlessly. I have introduced this to
my discussion of Pi because Martel explicitly disagrees with this sort of
view. He favours the baroque, he admires multiplicity, he is tolerant of
contradictions and incompatibilities, he denies that necessity is a virtue,
and he champions the imaginative transcendence of mere factuality. The
remainder of my reading of Pi will be aimed at adjudicating this dispute.
7.6
Ministry of Transport Investigators
In the final section of the novel, Martel creates a second framing device
for his story. Two officials from the Japanese Ministry of Transport,
Mr Chiba and Mr Okamoto, assigned to investigate the lost ship, are
sent to Mexico to interview the lone, and entirely unexpected, survivor.
Pi is now in the local infirmary, beginning to recover from his ordeal.
The Japanese officials have imperfect English, so they record their conversations with Pi. These exchanges are very amusing, but also very
disorienting. Chapter 96 reports them as asking Pi to tell them what
happened to him, with as much detail as possible (323). Chapter 97
just says, The story (324). That is, the whole story of the ordeal in
the lifeboat (chapters 37 to 94) is first told here. What we have read
in Part II is Martels version of an older Pis version of the story that
he told to the Transport Ministry men. Presumably, Chapter 97 was
shorter and less detailed than the version we have just read. The big
shock, however, is that the officials do not believe the story. Suddenly
we as readers are shifted from our suspension of disbelief. We have
read the story, of course, as a believable adventure. Reality is stranger
than fiction, we say, and when we read a story we are in believing mode.
Suddenly someone is saying, What about this algae island you say you
came upon? ... [It] is botanically impossible (326). Now about the
tiger, were not sure about it either (328), and so on. Pi in these pages
is a very self-assured teenager. He retorts, What you dont realize is
that we are a strange and forbidding species to wild animals. We fill
them with fear. They avoid us as much as possible (329).
In a lifeboat? Come on, Mr. Patel, its just too hard to
believe!
7.6. MINISTRY OF TRANSPORT INVESTIGATORS
183
Hard to believe? What do you know about hard to believe?

... Love is hard to believe, ask any lover. Life is hard to
believe, ask any scientist. God is hard to believe, ask any
believer. What is your problem with hard to believe?
Were just being reasonable.
So am I! I applied my reason at every moment. Reason is
excellent for getting food, clothing and shelter. Reason is the
very best tool kit. Nothing beats reason for keeping tigers
away. But be excessively reasonable and you risk throwing
out the universe with the bathwater.
Calm down, Mr. Patel, calm down. (330-1)
This sceptical inquisition continues for some time, and the reader
must now feel quite disoriented. What is the status of Pis story? The
investigators finally say,
We would like to know what really happened.
...
So you want another story?
Uhh . . . no. We would like to know what really happened.
...
I know what you want. You want a story that wont surprise
you. That will confirm what you already know. That wont
make you see higher or further or differently. You want a flat
story. An immobile story. You want dry, yeastless factuality
. . . You want a story without animals. (335-6)
This challenge of course returns us to the theme that was broached in
Part I.21 So Pi tells them another story, in which he swam to the lifeboat,
only reaching it because the French cook threw him a lifebuoy, and his
mother made it to the boat clinging to a bale of bananas. The sailor
was already aboard, with his broken leg. But the cook soon went out of
control, butchering the injured sailor for food and bait, and plundering
the boats supplies of water. He killed Pis mother when she attacked
21 See
p. 70, as quoted above at the end of section 2.
184
him for hitting her son. Pi killed him the next day, when the cook
perhaps mad, perhaps overcome with remorsedid not bother to resist.
Pi concludes, Solitude began. I turned to God. I survived (345). This
story is sometimes viscerally brutal. I shall not quote the gory bits, but
I am reminded of a scene in Martels earlier novel, Self, in which the
female narrator is raped.22 He is capable of evoking profound horror
and disgust.
The Japanese investigators ignore the horror and quickly point out
what the reader has probably already noticed: the two stories match.
The zebra and the sailor both have a broken leg. And the hyena bit off
the zebras leg just as the cook cut off the sailors (345). So the zebra is
the sailor, the orangutan is Pis mother, and the hyena is the cook, which
means that the tiger is Pi! This is a version of the shipwreck story with
four people in the lifeboat instead of one person and four wild animals.
We are reminded of several hints in the story itself that this may be
the truth. In Pis first version, he sees wild animals running about the
sinking ship. It is quite unlikely that the zoo animals would have been
freed from their cages. It is quite likely that hysterical people would
have galloped about the deck in terror, seeming quite beside themselves.
We are being led right from the start into Pis hallucination, his sense of
the incredible story that he is going to experience, and his disconnecting
from his everyday sense of reality in order to cope with the extremes into
which he is about to be plunged. Again, Richard Parker disappears for
three days at the beginning of the story and reappears when Pi has been
without food, water, or sleep for all that time. Perhaps it is no wonder
that he hallucinates a Bengal tiger.
My first reaction, at this point, was to think that the gentle sixteenyear-old Pi is traumatized by these events to such an extent that he must
cast the story in terms of animals. This would achieve two purposes: it
would allow him to think of the terrible cruelty of the cook as the natural
behaviour of a hyena; it would help him to acknowledge the murder of
his mother while treating it as more like the killing of a favourite zoo
22 Yann Martel, Self (Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 1996), 282-312. Martel often pursues
cosmic themes. Ways of dying is the subject of at least two of the four stories in his first book,
The Facts behind the Helsinki Roccamatios (Toronto: Alfred A. Knopf Canada, 1993), including
the title story. The other two deal, like Life of Pi, with the relation between art and reality.
7.7. WHICH IS THE BETTER STORY?
185
animal. So there are psychological reasons for his having told his tale as
one involving animals. That, however, would not make the story true.
7.7 Which Is the Better Story?

Now we are given a blunt choice. Pi asks: So tell me, since it makes no
factual difference to you and you cant prove the question either way,
which story do you prefer? Which is the better story, the story with
animals or the story without animals? Mr Chiba and Mr Okamoto agree
that the story with animals is the better story. Thank you, Pi replies,
And so it goes with God (352).
That is the punch line of the novel, or at least of Pis and Martels
argument. We are to accept the story that we prefer, rather than the one
that is parsimonious.23 It is not dry, yeastless factuality that we should
believe, but the better story, and if you are thinking of the ordeal in the
lifeboat, it is the story with the tiger. If you are thinking of the meaning
of life, it is the story with God. That is why this is a story that will make
the reader believe in God; the stories with God, the stories of the Hindus
and Christians and Muslims of the earlier discussion, make better stories
than the alternative theories. We remember the agnostic who to the very
end, lack[ed] imagination and miss[ed] the better story (70).
We need to ask ourselves what it is that makes a story better? When
we discussed Ockham we assumed that it would be something like simplicity. If the tigers and gods are unnecessary, then surely we should not
accept them as true just because we would prefer to have it that way!
Wittgenstein has a remarkable comment, towards the end of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, that seems to make room for explanations
that are less than the simplest:
The process of induction is the process of assuming the simplest law that can be made to harmonize with our experience.
23 In his own account of how the story came to him, Martel writes: reality is a story and we
can choose our story and so why not pick the better story (the novels key words)? It will be
clear that I do not entirely agree with the first two clauses of this metaphysics. See Yann Martel,
How I Wrote Life of Pi, http://www.powells.com/fromtheauthor/martel.html
(accessed 4 May 2004).
186
This process, however, has no logical foundation but only a

psychological one.
It is clear that there are no grounds for believing that the
simplest course of events will really happen.24
That is a purely logical remark. What is best for logic is not necessarily true of the world. Wittgenstein had an elegant metaphysics in
mind. The world is made up of facts. Each fact is independent of all the
others, so it can be true regardless of the truth or falsity of the other facts.
The way the world actually is, then, is a contingent matter. Nothing is
necessarily the case. The natural laws, or the patterns we see in events,
do not determine how things are, for the facts could always have been
otherwise. This is a clever account of reality and its laws. Surprisingly,
it leaves us not with Ockham (for there are many interesting similarities
between those two philosophers), but with Martel. Ironically, it leaves
us exactly in Pis position. If the two stories are equally completethey
both explain the murders and the survival ordeal, and neither explains
why the ship sank in the first placewhat makes us think that the simpler story is the better one? In fact, there are many reasons for thinking
that the story with the tiger is the better one. It is more inventive in its
appeal to the imagination, it is more instructive about the various characters of its participants, it is more astounding in its demands on our
credibility, but having won us over it is more gripping. I think that we
are actually more inclined to believe the story with the tiger than we are
to think that the bare-bones story is the real one. Those are powerful
qualities. It is important for the argument that we have not given up
explanatory power; each story explains as much as the other. Where
we gain, however, is that one story is more gripping, more imaginative,
more instructive, more inventive, more demanding, more insightful, and
more satisfying. The other story has fewer entities.
Martel ends his novel with the official report of the Transport Ministry investigators. It concludes: Very few castaways can claim to have
survived so long at sea as Mr. Patel, and none in the company of an adult
24 Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, tr. C.K. Ogden (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1922), 6.33-6.331.
7.8. IS THE TIGER REAL?
187
Bengal tiger (354). This sentence is presumably deliberately ambiguous. Literally it says that no castaway has survived in the company of
a tiger (and thus, not Pi either). As English is colloquially understood,
however, it means that no other castaway has survived in the company
of a tiger, as Pi has. In its context (the report contains phrases like an
astounding story of courage and endurance; unparalleled in the history
of shipwrecks), the sentence is bound to be taken in the latter sense. If
the Ministry of Transport officials accept Pis story of Richard Parker,
how could we readers not recognize it as the one worth accepting? Similarly, the story with God. We believe in the tiger, and we should believe
in God.
7.8 Is the Tiger REAL?

Must we believe in God? Must we believe in Richard Parker? I think
that the answer is no. At least I do not accept Martels argument that
we should. But does that mean that I think we have to make do with the
yeastless story?25 Not at all. I think that we can appreciate the better
story and have our tiger, but without being eaten by him, so to speak.
Pi did not make up the Richard Parker story just to amuse or confound the Ministry officials. I do not doubt that this is how he experienced his adventure. Thus there is an important sense in which I believe his story. I have mentioned some of the psychological pressures
that would have made it easier for him to see his trials and tribulations
through the filter of the zoo animals. I now want to propose that Richard
Parker is Pis doppelganger. He is Pis double. He is a being whom
Pi thinks of as separate, but who is a projection of himself. The doppelganger is often a ghostly second person who goes about with you,
and advises you, but is invisible to others. This is an old literary device,
that of the character who sees himself or herself as someone else. A recent example of it is the alter ego of the Russell Crowe character (John
Nash) in Ron Howards film A Beautiful Mind. A classical example is
25 Andrew Reynolds (of the University College of Cape Breton) pointed out to me that although yeastless is a wonderful metaphor, it can be deceiving if taken to mean that bread is
magically raised by yeast. There is a good biochemical account of what the yeast accomplishes;
the dichotomy between a yeasty explanation and a dry scientific one is a false dichotomy.
188
Edgar Allen Poes story William Williams, which remains ambiguous

until the end about how many Williams there are. The doppelganger
also marks a venerable psychological state: sometimes a person seems
to have multiple personalities, sometimes it takes the form of an out-ofbody experience; in any case, one sees oneself as an other and not as
oneself. In every case there is really only one person even though there
may appear to be two.
This is not the first time that Martel has explored this idea. I have
mentioned the rape scene in Self, where he uses the technique of writing
two columns per page. In one column are expressed the fear and pain
and horror of the suffering woman; in the other column are the lucid reflections of a disengaged intelligence trying to figure out how to escape
with her life. Martel expresses a very differently divided consciousness
using the same technique in the last of the stories collected in The Facts
behind the Helsinki Roccamatios, The Vita terna Mirror Company.
In this case a young man listens to his grandmothers recollections (in
one column), drifting off at times (in the other column) to his own reflections. These experiments with portraying a divided consciousness
can be seen as preparation for telling the story of a deeply divided Pi.
The doppelganger often can do things that serve as guidance to the
real person. Think of what Richard Parker does that Pi thinks he cannot
do: swim to the lifeboat, eat raw turtle, kill the cook, do whatever it
takes to survive regardless of the point of it. Pi, the gentle vegetarian
who believes that all gods are one, is but part of the whole person. He
could not have continued long on his own. We are all animals as well
as spiritual beings, and Pi implicitly realizes that Richard Parker is an
aspect of him which he cannot do without. His animal nature is of
course an aspect that must be tamed and kept in its place, as Richard
Parker quite literally is. But it is also an aspect of himself without which
he would not be complete and would certainly not have survived.
On this reading, no special explanation is needed for the disappearance of the double. A projection that has outlived its usefulness will
disappear into the jungle. On the other hand, a motive is required for its
appearance. Martel obliges. Clearly it was the terror that reigned during
the sinking of the ship. It was Pis fear that can be credited with having
7.8. IS THE TIGER REAL?
189
created the tiger. It was a tiger, after all, that had first scared the living
vegetarian daylights out of him. Now when he really confronts the fear
of death it takes the tigers form. When things have settled into a routine, and the tiger has been suitably subdued, we get a knowing chapter
on fear (chapter 56). It is followed by a line that I have already quoted:
It was Richard Parker who calmed me down, says Pi. It is the irony
of this story that the one who scared me witless to start with was the
very same who brought me peace, purpose, I dare say even wholeness
(179). That wholeness, I am proposing, is the reunification of Parker
and Pi.
I have told a story about a story about a storymy story about Martels story about Pis story. It is not the only story that could be told
about it. A reader of Life of Pi can surely appreciate it as a simple adventure tale, as a story of survival in a lifeboat with a tiger. Or as a
coming of age story: a story of growing up, leaving childhood, going
through the tribulations of leaving ones family behind and struggling
with teenage abandonment, before arriving safely at adulthood. Or as a
religious allegory: a story of being forced out of paradise, put through
the agonies of earthly life, and received at the end in a heavenly afterlife. Or as diasporic biography: a story of leaving India and suffering
huge dislocation and disorientation, before finding a new home as an
immigrant to Canada. It sustains all of those readings quite effortlessly.
The reader need not see it as a doppelganger story, with the tiger as Pis
alter ego, in order to have appreciated the book.
My story, however, has advantages. My account of what is going on
in Life of Pi does not have real animals in the lifeboat, and it requires
fewer miracles, fewer amendments to the laws of nature, than does the
one that Martel recommends.26 My story requires some extra psychological complexity, but overall it is simpler, it is more appropriate to our
other convictions, and it explains at least as many of the novels relevant details. It does not reduce the story to yeastless factuality, but it
26 One should not discuss a story of a boy and a tiger without mentioning Calvin and Hobbes.
Bill Wattersons cartoon Hobbes is a stuffed animal tiger who comes to life only when he and
Calvin are alone together. Hobbes is much more than a figment of the childs imagination; indeed
he takes the initiative and often raises the philosophical tone of their discussions. Nonetheless, he
is not a real tiger.
190
does not accept Martels claim that we should believe whatever flight
of imagination commands our fancy. It should follow that I also do not
accept Martels claim that Pis story should make us believe in God. I
shall leave the drawing of that conclusion, however, to my reader.
Finally, I wish to emphasize a different but very important lesson:
that the real interest and life in such an investigation begins with the
work of literature. Margaret Atwood says that this is a terrific book.
Its fresh, original, smart, devious, and crammed with absorbing lore.27
She is reminding us that it is the novel that is of first importance. I think
that Martel is right that you miss the better story if you are not gripped
by Pis predicament, and so share his terror and his courage, and believe
in Richard Parker. But the considerations that have led me to read it as
I have, and to argue that it makes a false claim about metaphysics, have
a life of their own. They are the stuff of philosophy.
27 Margaret Atwood in a Sunday Times review, quoted on the front cover of the paperback
edition of Life of Pi.
Part Two:
Theoretical Engagement
Chapter 8
David Braybrookes Philosophy of

Social Science
M EREDITH R ALSTON
Abstract
This chapter will examine David Braybrookes contribution to the philosophy of social science, specifically, and to feminist epistemology, indirectly, through an assessment of his 1987 book Philosophy of Social
Science and his 1998 updates in Moral Objectives, Rules and the Forms
of Social Change (chapter 13) and The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. His detailed examples from naturalist, interpretive, and critical
social science illustrate how the three sides of social science contain and
complete the others. The chapter will show how his articulation of the
mutual support and stimulation within the philosophy of social science
has paralleled, and in some ways anticipated, feminist critiques of epistemology and the development of feminist methodologies themselves. To
do this, I will look at the traditional field of the philosophy of social science, examine what Braybrooke has added to the debate, and look at how
his ideas resonate with the latest ideas in feminist epistemology and philosophy of social science. I will argue that his belief in a unity of method
between naturalists and interpretive social scientists melds with a naturalized feminist epistemology of the kind espoused by Richmond Campbell
and Lynn Nelson, and may help overcome what seems to be the inherent
relativism of Sandra Hardings feminist standpoint theory.
193
CHAPTER 8. MEREDITH RALSTON
194
8.1
Introduction
In the famous phrase of the now-cancelled television show The X Files,

The Truth Is Out There. In TV land, the phrase is meant to show that
conspiracies are all around us and are being covered up by sinister and
unknown forces. With enough investigation, the truth will be revealed
and all will be known. This idea of a universal, knowable truth is a popular idea, but how real is it? What does this idea mean for understanding
our reality and the world around us? Is this a fair representation of how
we know and what we know? Is knowledge just waiting to be found
like another planet, perhaps, beyond Pluto? Has it always been there,
or do we have to go and create knowledge? These are the issues and
questions dealt with by epistemologythe study or theory of the nature
and foundations of knowledgewhich asks how do we know, what can
we know, and, more recently, who can know. These are also the central
concerns of the philosophy of social science.
This chapter will examine Braybrookes contribution to the philosophy of social science, specifically, and to feminist epistemology, indirectly, through an assessment of his 1987 book Philosophy of Social
Science and his 1998 updates in Moral Objectives, Rules and the Forms
of Social Change (chapter 13) and The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. His detailed examples from naturalist, interpretive, and critical
social science illustrate how the three sides of social science contain
and complete the others. The chapter will show how his articulation
of the mutual support and stimulation within the philosophy of social
science has paralleled, and in some ways anticipated, feminist critiques
of epistemology and the development of feminist methodologies themselves. To do this, I will look at the traditional field of the philosophy of
social science, examine what Braybrooke has added to the debate, and
look at how his ideas resonate with the latest ideas in feminist epistemology and philosophy of social science. I will argue that his belief in
a unity of method between naturalists and interpretive social scientists
melds with a naturalized feminist epistemology of the kind espoused by
Richmond Campbell and Lynn Nelson, and may help overcome what
seems to be the inherent relativism of Sandra Hardings feminist stand-
8.2. TRADITIONAL PHILOSOPHY OF SOCIAL SCIENCE
195
point theory.
8.2 Traditional Philosophy of Social Science

How do we know that the tree is ten metres high? How do we know
that Mary is sad? Is knowing that the tree is ten metres tall the same
sort of thing as knowing why Mary is sad? How do we know whether
something is true or false? How do we know that our best friend
wasnt abducted by aliens when she reports that she was? How do we
know any sort of crazy thing we see in the tabloids? Do we know anything? Our answers to these questions generally depend on our view of
knowledge itself and the relevance of the knower. Is knowledge universal, rational, and objective or is it socially and historically specific? Is
knowledge independent of the knower (because the particular knower
is irrelevant) or is it subjective and dependent on the knower? Rationalists and empiricists have answered these questions differently and
opposed each other particularly in the area of how we know: rationalists relying on reason and a priori knowledge and empiricists relying to
a greater extent on the senses, observation, and the scientific method.
Today, most philosophers and social scientists are empiricists of some
sort, though their emphases on what is knowledge and who can know
differ according to what philosophy of social science they follow. Are
they objectivists and believe that the idea of knowledge they pursue (at
least in the ideal) should be absolute and foundational, or are they relativists and believe that knowledge is contextual, culture-bound, and that
there is no ultimate measure of truth?
Traditionally, the philosophy of social science has been divided into
three main schools: naturalism, interpretive, and critical theory. N
aturalists, who take their name from the natural sciences and the study
of the natural world, believe that we can know the social world in basically the same way as we do in the natural sciences. We can find
patterns in social life; the cause and effect of events and behaviour can
be determined. There will be laws of human behaviour to discover, just
as there are laws of gravity and motion, and causal regularities to be
discerned. There is a reality to be known independent of the knower,
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and this reality can be verified through observation and measurement

(Nielsen (1990)). The methods of the physical and scientific world,
therefore, can be applied to the social world, and to naturalists, the
scientific method ensures that results are tested, replicable, verified, or
falsified. This doesnt mean that scientists believe that they have necessarily discovered the truth but that they are getting ever more truthful
accounts of the world and explanations for natural phenomena (though,
according to Kuhn, not necessarily through a linear process of accumulation). Everything has a cause, but then that thing has a cause and so on
and so on. The scientific method is a spiral process according to many
scientists (Kournay (1987)). An experiment starts with observations of
a certain phenomenon and then the scientist searches for regularities,
trying to discover regular patterns and explanations for why these regularities occur. These explanations help to develop the theory or hypothesis, which is tested and used to make further predictions. The process
then starts over with more observations, further predictions, which are
verified or falsified and then adjusted (Hempel 1966). A simple chemistry experiment that both tests a law and makes predictions would be
as follows: according to the law of conservation of mass, substances
cannot lose or gain mass during a chemical change; that is, the mass of
a substance before reaction will equal the mass of the substances after
the experiment. If mercury oxide (x), for example, is heated and transformed into liquid mercury (y) and oxygen gas (z), one can predict how
much oxygen is in the compound by knowing the weight of the mercury oxide before decomposition and the weight of the liquid mercury
afterwards (x - y = z). The law itself can also be tested by weighing the
two remaining substances and confirming that the mass has indeed been
conserved, within experimental error (y + z = x).
Many naturalists believe that a logical argument in the form of
testable statements of facts and laws creates explanations, predictions,
and statistical regularities. For Carl Hempel, a good scientific explanation requires asking the question: according to what general laws and
by virtue of what antecedent conditions does the phenomenon occur
(Hempel (1966))? A deductive argument gives the strongest possible
grounds for believing the conclusion is true and gives strong grounds
197
for believing the conclusion if the argument is inductive. For example,

if all metal conducts electricity (the law), and this is a copper, therefore
metal, wire (the facts or antecedent conditions), then this wire conducts
electricity (thing to be explained). Or (more problematically) in the social sciences, if 80 per cent of street prostitutes were sexually abused
as children, and this woman is a prostitute, then there is an 80 per cent
chance that this woman was sexually abused as a child. Though most
naturalists recognize that the social world is a good deal more complex
and unpredictable than the natural world, they believe we can still find
causal regularities and statistical generalizations within the social world.
I nterpretive theorists claim that naturalists fail to recognize human
intentionality, motives, social context, and peoples ability to change.
They believe that the social world and hence social sciences are not like
the natural sciences. To explain some event or behaviour in the social
world requires understanding the meaning behind the actions, and that
depends on context and particularly on social relationships. In oft-given
examples, what does it mean to put ones hand in the air? Is the person voting, waving, signalling, or saluting? Understanding which it is
and why requires knowing the context of the vote, wave, or salute. No
causal regularity can cover all the possible interpretations and possible
meanings; that is, if a person raises his hand it means x, he has raised
his hand, so therefore it means x. In the above example outlining the
percentages of street prostitutes who have been sexually abused, what
really can be said about the particular prostitute? Though it might be
part of the explanation for why this particular woman ended up as a
street prostitute, what about all the women who have been abused but
who dont end up on the streets? And what if she wasnt sexually abused
or is in denial about the sexual abuse? The fact that 80 per cent of street
prostitutes are sexually abused says little about the individual prostitute,
according to the interpretive point of view. How did she become a prostitute? Why does she think she became a prostitute? Did she choose
this life? What is life like for her? These questions, argue interpretive
theorists, are not dealt with by looking for a logical argument in the
naturalist tradition. Many more examples can be found to illustrate the
need for understanding contexts. Are you chopping wood for a fire, for
198
exercise, for building a house, or for working out frustrations? Why is

a piece of paper a bookmark, and not scrap? Why is this death a murder
and that one a suicide? Is the cause of death a brain hemorrhage or is it
driver negligence, slippery roads, or drunk driving?
I nterpretive theorists object to the scientific method on at least five
grounds: controlled experimentation, they believe, is impossible when
dealing with humans and makes prediction and repeatability difficult;
social phenomena are culturally and historically determined, and so it is
very difficult to predict changes in communities or individuals; human
beings modify their behaviour as a result of acquiring additional knowledge; humans have goals and motivations that cant be accounted for;
and the inherent subjectivity of human behaviour cannot be predicted
(Nielsen (1990)). Prediction in the social world is a particular problem
for naturalist social scientists, according to interpretive theory, because
of human will and decision-making. We may be able to predict with
some accuracy that if we mix two parts of hydrogen with one part oxygen well get water (H2 O), or that one part carbon and two parts oxygen
equals carbon dioxide (CO2 ), but can we predict with any reliability that
combining poverty and poor education in one individual will result in
criminal behaviour? And does prediction explain something anyway?
A barometer may predict rain, but its the change in atmospheric conditions that explains why it is raining. Similarly, spots on a child may
predict measles, but its the virus that explains why the child is sick.
Finally, interpretive theorists argue that the value-neutrality of the sciences is impossible in the social sciences because of the value-oriented
bias of social inquiry. This will be developed more fully below.
N aturalists counter that controlled experiments are not crucial to the
project of the sciences or social sciences. Astronomy and astrophysics,
for example, dont use experimentation but rely on observation, mathematics, and computer simulations. The common denominator is the
scientific method, which creates a logical set of procedures for observing change, or predicting behaviour by keeping some factors constant
and changing others. For example, though not experimenting per se,
astronomers rely on the scientific methods goals of prediction, testability, falsifiability, and verifying data through simulation. A computer
199
program, for instance, is used to show how two galaxies might look after colliding with each other, based on the known elements of the two
galaxies. Astronomers then use observational tools to look for similar
patterns in the cosmos to see what, if anything, most closely resembles
the modelled simulation.
Naturalists agree that prediction is difficult in the social sciences
but believe that common patterns can be found and human subjectivity,
goals, and motivations can be used as social variables and part of the
antecedent conditions of the explanation. The goal of a rigorous scientific method should be adhered to because, they argue, it is still the
best way that we know of at this point in history to understand natural
phenomena. As one scientist friend reminds me, no matter who does
the testing, if you drop something it will fall and hell be able to predict
how long it will take to hit the ground, just as one of Newtons laws
predicts. Or put another way, naturalists believe there are facts about
the world, regardless of whether we have discovered them yet (that is,
regardless of who is the knower). Pluto (as either a planet or asteroid)
would continue to exist whether we had found it or not. Most scientists
have faith that though the scientific method isnt perfect it eventually
weeds out theories and ideas that are found to be falsefor instance,
that the sun revolves around the earth, that the earth is flat, that the universe was created only 5000 years ago. The scientific method, then, is a
useful tool to undermine ideas that cant be tested, like creationism, or
fantastical ideas such as the popular science fiction theme in movies like
The Matrix that the world has only actually existed for a few minutes
and that all our memories, lives, and ideas are continuously re-created.
Though it is still the goal of some scientists to elaborate a grand theory that will unify, for example, the fields of electricity, magnetism, and
gravity, most scientists recognize that different views are debated until
a consensus in the community is reached and that they come into the
experiment or simulation with preconceptions and assumptions about
certain laws and theories (Kuhn (1962)). Further, we should not forget that in terms of justification of scientific knowledge, philosophers of
science like Popper and others argued that since theories can never be
positively confirmed, scientists can only falsify theories one at a time.
200
Theories that are not eliminated then may be true or may be very probably true. This indicates a far more nuanced view of truth than interpretive and critical theorists usually give scientists credit for. Perhaps the
most one can say, even for naturalists, is that truth, or properly justified true belief in philosophical terms, is to be seen as an attainment
goal or concept, not as truth itself, and always relative to the particular
scientific context (Kuhn (1962)).
The third traditional school in the philosophy of the social sciences is
critical theory. Developed from the Marxist critique of ideology, critical theorists see themselves as doing emancipatory work, uncovering
what had been hidden and finding the realities masked behind dominant
ideologies (Nielsen (1990)). Knowledge is socially constructed and the
context of knowledge is all important to understanding, explaining, and
uncovering knowledge. Critical theorists reject the idea of objective
knowledge and the disinterested, neutral knower of naturalism, and the
emphasis on meaning and understanding in interpretive theory. The
point, as Marx famously put it, is not merely to understand the world
but to change it. Critical theorists want to unmask ideologies that go
against many peoples best interests but are seen to be the only possible
ideas or systems, for example, the idea that capitalism is the only efficient mode of production. Or that human nature is naturally aggressive
and competitive.
There is no value-free knowledge, according to critical theorists, because knowledge is socially constructed and situated. Undermining naturalisms fact-value distinction is crucial for critical theorists because
separating the two out makes it appear that there is such a thing as
facts on the one hand (objective and true) and mere values or opinions on the other (subjective and perhaps false). This separation, according to critical theorists, hides the ideology and biases that occur
even in so-called facts and within the underlying values of the research
itself. For instance, if a quantitative research study concluded that because of the massive abuse of the welfare system by welfare recipients
people on welfare should be cut off from their support, critical theorists
might question what were the essential values and world-view of the
researchers in the first place. Do they believe that people on welfare are
8.3. BRAYBROOKES CONTRIBUTION
201
lazy or, alternatively, do they see them as victims? Is the study simply
confirming what the researchers think about poor people and/or, more
broadly, what a capitalist mode of production needs in order to function
efficientlythat is, have a large reserve army of labour?
Critical theorists also began the work of standpointthat is, that disadvantaged groups have the potential for a more holistic view of reality
because of their oppressed position in society. As a tool for survival, according to critical theorists, the proletariat, the black slave, and women
have a better or more complete view of the world than their bourgeois,
white, or male counterpart. The connections between critical theory,
anti-relativism, and feminism will be developed below.
8.3
Braybrookes Contribution to the Philosophy of Social

Science
Outlined so starkly, there seems to be little overlap and agreement between the three schools within the philosophy of social science, and this
is Braybrookes starting point. He also indicates the helpfulness of an
influential article by Brian Fay and Donald Moon, called What Would
an Adequate Philosophy of Social Science Look Like? (Fay and Moon
(1977)). In this article, the authors ask three questions aimed at establishing that the division between naturalism and interpretive theory is
unnecessary: What is the relationship between interpretation and explanation? What is the nature of social scientific theory? And what is the
role of critique? These questions provide the framework for a sophisticated argument outlining how each side is lacking: the naturalists dont
see the need for interpretation of meaning, and the interpretive theorists
dont see the need for explanation and theories. An adequate account
of the social sciences needs both, according to Fay and Moon, and also
needs the questions asked only by critical theory.
Braybrooke agrees. In his 1987 book, he begins by outlining the
distinguishing characteristics of the three sides of the social sciences.
Naturalism, as stated above, relies on the methods from the natural sciences and looks for causal generalizations and regularities. Interpretive
theory attempts to bring to light what the actions that people do signify,
202
looking for settled social rules. Critical theory refuses to take at face
value the rules cited by the interpretive view or the causal regularities of
naturalism (Braybrooke (1987b), 4). Regardless of the real differences
between the three sides, his aim is to show how robust are all three and
how complexly interconnected (4). None of them has exclusive truth
and the differences coexist with a great number of parallels (5). Critical theory, he argues, asks different questions but its methods reduce
to those of the other two. Therefore, there is a unity within the social
sciences. In his 1998 update, he goes further, suggesting that a settled
social rule presupposes the existence of corresponding causal regularities in social phenomena and vice versa (Braybrooke (1998a), 251).
Moreover, he argues regularities found in social phenomena would not
have the foundation in personal choices and actions that they must have
to be fully explained in our eyes as producers of social science or as
consumers of it if they did not have a foundation in choices and actions
guided by rules (257). In his 1998 essay in the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, he also takes on the contribution of postmodernism
to the debate about the philosophy of social sciences and claims that
though aspects of postmodernism are helpful in understanding the limits of knowledge, some of the claims are so radically sceptical as to undermine the possibilities of knowledge and social science itself, and this
he does not want to do (Braybrooke (1998b), 846). Therefore, though
postmodernism can be seen as a separate (fourth) option to naturalism,
interpretive, and critical theory, Braybrooke takes postmodernism as a
variation of critical theory, in terms of his claims about unity (Braybrooke (1998b)).
These are strong claims, and adherents of all three schools (and particularly of postmodernism) will object to the explicit idea of a unity.
How does he make these claims? First, he shows how naturalism tends
to concentrate on different questions, facts, and concerns than interpretive theory, specifically in looking at group facts, that is, how groups
operate as opposed to how individuals operate within those groups.
As mentioned above, naturalism is definitely in the minority among
philosophers and social scientists today: as Braybrooke says, its quite
out of fashion (Braybrooke (1987b), 7). He asks the questions, Are all
203
group actions, in fact, reducible to individual actions within the group?

And are these group facts inherently less interesting than the interpretive
emphasis on the individual? Surely not, he says, on both issues.
Braybrooke outlines an example of naturalistic social science that
relies on group facts and causal regularities: Leon Epsteins article on
the differences between Canadian and American political parties and
their cohesion or lack thereof, respectively (Epstein (1964)). In the article Epstein asks the question, Why do Canadian political parties, unlike American parties put in disciplined and cohesive performances in
national legislatures? His answerby looking at the ways in which
Canada and the United States are similar and differentis that it is the
British parliamentary system (the major difference) which accounts for
the differences in the behaviour of their political parties. As Braybrooke
says, using Mills method of agreement and/or difference (Braybrooke
(1987b), 8), Epstein would be correct in arguing that though Canada
and the United States share several features in common (including a
large land mass, a federal system, and federal and provincial parties),
it is the main difference between them that explains the difference in
political parties, that is, Canadas use of the British parliamentary system and the United Statess use of the presidential system. Conversely,
though Canada and the UK are quite different in some respects (with
the UK having a small land mass, a unitary system, and only national
parties), Canada and the UK share the British parliamentary system and
therefore both have cohesive political parties.
Braybrooke shows that Epsteins reasoning is naturalistic because
the solution is a causal statement (whenever a country has the British
parliamentary system, it has cohesive parties; Canada has the parliamentary system, therefore, Canada has cohesive political system), and it
implies a counterfactual (if Canada didnt have the British parliamentary
system, we wouldnt have cohesive parties) and a causal generalization
(if you want cohesive parties you need the British parliamentary system)
(9). We will come back to this example shortly. For an example of interpretive theory, Braybrooke uses Elliot Liebows research on Tallys Corner, a famous study of a group of unemployed African-American men
in Washington, DC (Liebow (1965)). In the study, Liebow observed and
204
interviewed the men. He concluded that they start out their adult lives
looking for jobs, but because they lack higher education, they are only
able to get menial jobs. The menial jobs dont pay very much and the
men dont get much respect. Their future looks bleak so they give up
and dont work at all. This affects their relationships with the women
in their lives and particularly the mothers of their children, whom they
dont treat very well. Liebow then asked the question, Why do these
men act as they do? His answer: because they cant be good family
providers, they set up alternative rules, and act in ways that support a
macho image of themselves, to deal with their failures as husbands and
fathers. Its an interpretive study, according to Braybrooke, because the
study is qualitativeLiebow deals with the meaning behind the actions
of the menand because its about social rules and conforming or failing to conform to rules.
For critical theory, Braybrooke doesnt articulate a specific real-life
example but instead uses critical theory to critique the naturalistic and
interpretive examples. From a critical theorists point of view, Epsteins
example would be banal or uninteresting at best, an ideological obfuscation at worst. Epstein takes the current system at face value, doesnt
look at whose interests the political system serves. And the study could
rationalize the current system because it fails to show that any opposition is a sham anyway, because no parties will threaten the interests of
the property-owning groups. Braybrooke says Liebow would fare better, but, even so, critical theorists would most likely have issues with
Liebows assumptions about capitalism and the welfare statethat is,
that the market is imperfect but generally beneficialand his lack of
recognition that alternative arrangements are available but hidden from
the masses by a dominant ideology. None of this deeper critique is done
by Liebow, so his example would be considered limited as well, by critical theorists (Braybrooke (1987b), 17-18).
Though critical theorists ask different questions and see themselves
as delving deeper into critique than naturalist or interpretive theorists,
Braybrooke argues that they use the same methods as interpretive theory and naturalism. The interpretive side of critical theory lies in the
emphasis on comparing what social scientists aim at doing, under cer-
205
tain rules that express their recognized aims and their activities, with
what they are doing unawares or unawares omitting to do (70). Critical theorists tend to rely on qualitative methods and try to understand
the meaning behind or underneath something, like interpretive theorists.
Support for pluralism within political science, for example, according
to a critical perspective, leads either to ignoring unorganised groups
or to postulating that they have special means of representation (70).
The naturalistic side of critical theory comes out in the Marxist critique
of ideology in that it upholds a specific theoretical explanation of the
omissions and distortions which it finds in subcritical social science
(76). That is, a causal connection is used to explain how change occurs
historically because of changes within a particular class structure. The
major problem for admitting the naturalist bent of critical theory will
occur with the fact-value distinction and critical theorys opposition to
this distinction. Braybrooke argues that this should be a problem for
critical theory only because it is a fallacy, according to him, to argue
that because a study can be found to be ideological, that every statement in that body ... has an ideological cast and import (81). Put even
more starkly, he argues that every single statement in a set of statements about social phenomena can be true, yet the whole set can have
ideological, distortive consequences for peoples thinking (81). The
difference between the two (the possibility of statements of fact vs the
ideological impact of those facts and of the study as a whole) must be
sorted out and supported by evidence. This will be important later when
we look at Sandra Hardings work.
Braybrooke also argues, convincingly, that Marx himself used both
naturalist and interpretive methods. Marxs social science was, according to Braybrooke,
naturalistic in explaining the ideas of subcritical social scientists as determined ultimately by the roles given them in
social arrangements that are causal consequences of the current system of production. It is interpretative in the details
with which this determination works out, including the rules
that social scientists accept and conform to because of their
class position. (83-4)
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Braybrooke leaves critical theory at this point to concentrate on his

main argument that there is a unity within the social sciences, not just
a unity of method between critical theorists and naturalist and interpretive theorists. He returns to his examples to show how inadequate they
are on their own and how they need elements of the others to be complete. While it may be true, Braybrooke argues, that Epsteins example
is a logical argument (that is, whenever a country has the British parliamentary system, it has cohesive parties [the law]; Canada has the parliamentary system [the facts]; therefore, Canada has cohesive political
system [the thing to be explained]), without more information into what
explains the law itself (that is, what explains why the parliamentary system creates cohesive political parties), the example is inadequate. The
argument, though a logical explanation, still then fails to explain why
Canada has cohesive political parties. To do this, Braybrooke argues,
we need individual person facts as well as the group facts, and rules
as well as regularities. For instance, individual members of Parliament
in the Canadian system vote as a bloc because they dont want to be
kicked out of the party, and they dont want to run as independents. But
why dont American members of Congress worry about the same thing?
Because of the rule in parliamentary systems that says that if you are a
member of the governing party, you must not vote against it. Again,
why not in the presidential system? It is because of elements of the
parliamentary system that need to be explained, that is, that in a parliamentary system there are no fixed election terms and a potential vote of
non-confidence could bring down a government. If a government falls,
an election must be called and MPs could lose their seats. Because of
the separation of powers in the American system, and because there is
no vote of non-confidence, even the impeachment of a president would
have little effect on the majority party in the Congress. Therefore, individual members of Congress are far less likely to vote as a bloc. All
of this information is needed in order to explain why Canadian political
parties, unlike American political parties, act in disciplined and cohesive ways in our national legislature. We need to know group facts and
person facts, social rules, and causal regularities. The regularity shows
that Canadian political parties are more cohesive than American; the
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rule that tells individual MPs to vote as a bloc explains why. And vice
versa. Canadian political parties are more cohesive than American ones
because individual MPs vote as a bloc, and individual MPs vote as a
bloc because of elements of the Canadian political system that make
political parties more cohesive than American ones.
Braybrooke outlines how even loose regularities can be helpful, how
laws can be developed, even if transitory or specific to a community, and
how the model-theoretic view in naturalism could be used by interpretive social scientists. In his 1998 essay, he particularly concentrates on
the model-theoretic view and shows how this approach relieves social
science of the burden of finding regularities that hold for all societies
(Braybrooke (1998b), 840). As he states, even the natural sciences have
revised the view that laws hold for all time and now use a system that
sets up models that are true for that model only. The model is then used
to show how other models resemble one range or another of phenomena closely enough to be more useful than other models in prediction
and explanation (840).
In Liebows study, we see the development of social rules that are
conformed to, denied, or changed. The men on Tallys Corner start by
following a rule that says they cannot have respect unless they are regular providers, and in order to retain self-respect (because they cant follow this societal rule) they oppress the women in their lives. Braybrooke
then shows how this example, though clearly interpretive, has naturalist
tendencies. The conformity or lack of conformity to rules are solutions
to problems (how the men cope with their circumstances); the solutions
are the explanation and can be put into the form of a logical argument (if
you are a married man and want respect, you must provide for your family (the law); this man is married but cant provide (the facts); therefore,
he gets no respect and treats his family badly (thing to be explained);
and Liebows findings are empirical, meaning he observes the men, he
is looking for repeated patterns of behaviour, and the study can be replicated with a similar group and verified or falsifiedall characteristic
of naturalism, not interpretive social science. Further, these facts could
have been quantified (say, more than 50 or 75 per cent of the men in
this area act in similar ways), and therefore, statistical regularities can
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be developed. Braybrooke uses examples of other quantitative research

studies on unemployment and friendships to demonstrate how use of
statistics could help to explain why the men on Tallys Corner have no
jobs (39) and why their friendships are so loose and fitful (41). Thus,
to complete the picture of the men on Tallys Corner, group facts (societal rules and regularities) are needed as well as interpretive person facts
(how the particular individual gives meaning to his actions). Therefore,
Braybrooke gives a very convincing argument that there are both person facts and group facts on both sides (60) and that both theories
methods, questions, and facts are needed for an adequate explanation.
But as stated in the beginning of this section, Braybrooke doesnt
want to just say that both naturalism and interpretive theory are needed
in order to have an adequate explanation for a certain phenomenon. In
his final chapter, then, he goes further by arguing that the key idea of
each side presupposes the key idea of the other (94). Rules, which he
defines as prescriptions or prohibitions to which clear forms of punishment attach as deterrents to deviation (111), draw on regularities, and
regularities (causal explanations like the rates of inflation, unemployment, or divorce) draw on rules for their very definition. From every social rule an observable regularity may be deduced (116), and from regularities of inflation, for instance, we can deduce rules for exchanging
goods or setting prices. A naturalists ideas about rates of employment
cannot exist without accepting some interpretative account of what it
means to have a job (112). In the same way, interpretive social scientists are interested in whether husbands try to be steady providers. It
cannot find whether they do without counting how often they turn up
for a job when they have one, and how often they bring home their paychecks (112). As an article in the local paper described recently, fatal
collisions on Nova Scotia highways have steadily decreased since 1984
(the statistical regularity) because of the laws against drunk driving and
the increased use of seatbelts (the rules). If there hadnt been a problem
to be addressed (the rate of fatal collisions) there would be no reason for
the rules against drunk driving or in favour of seatbelts. If there were
no rules against drunk driving, there would probably be the same rates
of fatal collisions, or then another cause would be identified, and so on.
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In the case of this article, the increased rate of fatal collisions this particular year was an anomaly to be explained by the increased speeding
of drivers, itself a rule that has been violated (Lipscombe (2004), A1).
Rules and regularities, therefore, presuppose the other.
Braybrooke concludes his 1987 book with a caveat about generalizations: the fact that the generalization applies only to one agent does
not prevent it from being a generalization (126), and he accepts as fact
that generalization is the ambition of social science (128). In his 1998
update, Braybrooke addresses the postmodern challenge inherent in
any claim about generalization by undermining the claim of universality even in naturalism. As mentioned above, scientists no longer think of
themselves as searching for the truth but argue that scientific success
happens in local contexts and only for a time (Braybrooke (1998b),
839). The postmodern concern with grand narratives and globalizing
discourses (844) has led to recognition that discourse is power and that
claims for knowledge become conflicts of power or to wills to truth
(844). Postmodernists attack the idea of a unified view of the world,
yet even Foucaults theory comes with claims of truth, or at least some
approximation of truth (844). According to Braybrooke, even these
sweeping pronouncements can be accommodated by the three schools
(845). Braybrooke argues that postmodernists
like Foucault and Lyotard bring back the study of rules ...
with an emphasis more thorough-going than any other philosopher[s] ... But if there can be models of systems of rules
just as there can be models of regularities then how far a
model fits a real system, in regard to any universally quantified statement that figures in the model, is a matter for
quantitativestatisticalstudy just as much with rules as
with regularities. (845)
Methodologically, therefore, both interpretive and naturalist questions are in play with postmodernism and now in a form that is ready
to receive the insistence of postmodern writers on truth being local, a
matter of limited context that is always subject to supersession (845).
Though Braybrooke acknowledges the impact of postmodernism on the
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philosophy of social science and accepts certain of their limiting claims

on knowledge, he would resist any further-reaching scepticism (839).
Because some of the postmodern critique is so sceptical of even the possibility of knowledge, Braybrooke argues, we may thus have to allow
in the philosophy of social science for a school that (unlike any of the
three schools in the framework) holds that social science is not possible.
We do not have to join it (846).
In the next section, I want to show how Braybrookes claims about
a unity of method, and his arguments about universality and generalizations, anticipate feminist critiques and also how these arguments could
be used to overcome some of the polarizing debates currently happening
within feminist philosophy of social science.
8.4
Feminist Epistemologies and Critiques of Social Science
The links to feminist epistemology in Braybrookes work may not seem

obvious at first glance. Braybrooke does not engage directly with feminism in his 1987 book or in the 1998 updates and, therefore, does not
think of feminism as a school (in its own right) within the philosophy of social science. Braybrookes example of naturalistic social science does not on the surface have anything to do with women, and his
interpretive example deals only with the male perspective and doesnt
mention at all how the women feel about the mens behaviour towards
them and their children. Nevertheless, I would argue that there are links,
overlaps, and resonances with feminist social science and epistemology
in four areas. First, his argument that critical theory shares a unity
of method with interpretive and naturalist theory is similar to the current debate within feminism about whether there is a distinctive feminist method or whether what makes feminism unique are the distinctive
questions and focus on women. In some ways, we could see the development of feminist epistemology as a parallel to critical theory. Braybrookes comments about critical theory, though obviously different in
content, are therefore applicable at the level of the distinctive questions
and deeper critique. Second, Braybrooke defends quantitative methods
and acknowledges that interpretive and critical theorists tend to disdain
8.4. FEMINIST EPISTEMOLOGIES
211
quantitative methods and statistics. As Braybrooke writes, they dislike

and distrust quantitative methods ... so they are inclined to scorn quantitative methods and denounce them as inappropriate to the study of social
phenomena (Braybrooke (1987b), 35). This rings true with some feminist researchers and again resonates with current debates. Third, his
views on the problems of universality and generalization can be applied
to feminist debates about feminist empiricism and feminist standpoint
and, particularly, the extent to which research in the social sciences can
be generalized without essentializing some aspect of it. Finally, the
problem of the fact-value distinction calls for examination in the light of
feminist concerns about objectivity and subjectivity, and Braybrookes
work can be useful here, too.
Philosophers and social scientists who have been concerned with
feminism have tried several strategies for ensuring womens voices are
heard. One of the first methods in most of the social sciences and humanities was simply adding women in to rediscover womens history
and contributions, to recognize that womens experiences had been left
out, and to ask questions that had not been asked before or which had
not been seen as important. Historians discovered womens lost history,
political scientists examined womens political engagement, and sociologists looked for connections between family violence and womens
economic dependence in the home. The focus shifted over time from
adding women in to putting women at the centre of analysis and looking
at what life was like for women. So, for example, doing a feminist analysis of Liebows study would mean interviewing the women on Tallys
Corner, examining how they felt about their lives, about why their men
acted as they did and why they accepted or rejected this behaviour. Like
the discovery of X-rays, what was invisible became visible with the new
focus on womens experiences of abuse, family life, work, sexuality, and
more. As feminist critiques became more common, new methodologies
were created and old, male methods were criticized. The scientific
method was particularly critiqued for its supposed neutrality, objectivity, and universality.
Feminist ways of knowing came to be identified with anti-naturalism
and anti-science. Qualitative, participatory, and collaborate research
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methods were identified as feminist, and science and scientific method

were rejected as inherently male. Feminist philosophers like Sandra
Harding began to question whether epistemologys concern for objectivity hid a subjective point of view and asked whether a politicized
inquiry, ironically, might be less distorted than a so-called point-ofviewlessness. She argued that the scientific method for all its heralded
objectivity and universality was actually developed with a particular
knower in mind, that is, a white, middle-class, highly educated male,
and that its supposed neutrality could not withstand scrutiny. Many
other feminist philosophers criticized the maleness of philosophy and
the underlying male-as-norm ideology (Lloyd (1984); Westcott (1990)).
The knower or researcher became crucial to the project of feminism because it was at this level that feminism identified the distortion and biases affecting the outcomes of research. As well, the separation between
researcher and the thing being researched became another problematic
of the scientific method, in particular, as feminists saw the separation
as objectifying and distancing, not as ensuring objectivity as did traditional researchers.
But is it the method that is the problem or is it the underlying methodology and epistemologythat is, are feminists actually doing something different empirically from traditional sociologists or political scientists, or are they asking different questions, looking at different phenomena and coming to different conclusions? The main point of contention between feminist and traditional social scientists seems now to
be the question of objectivity, which we will look at in more detail below. Feminist researchers, generally, dont accept the notion that the
researcher should be on a different plane from the researched. They
reject the idea that in order to keep the research as objective as possible
the researcher cant give opinions or engage in conversations with the
researched (supposedly to remove bias and prevent so-called subjectivity) and therefore contaminate the research. But this position is becoming more common even in naturalist social science, as stated above in
the analysis of Braybrookes work. In a working paper for Status of
Women Canada, on the state of feminist research, Damaris Rose parallels Braybrooke when she states that developments in quantum physics
213
have established that even in natural science there is no such thing as

pure observation uninfluenced by the observer (Rose (2001), 6) and
that claims for validity based on researcher/research object separations
have less credence than previously (6).
Recent work in feminist epistemology and methodology suggests
that there is not a separate feminist method but that feminists tend to
use a multi-method approach, somewhat like what Braybrooke is suggesting for the social sciences as a whole. Multi-method means mixing individual interviews with focus groups and perhaps surveys and
archival work, that is, qualitative and quantitative research methods
(Rose (2001); Reinharz (1992)). The feminism becomes the underpinning of the study, of the questions and critiques that the researcher
brings to it. As Braybrooke stated, critical theory may ask different
questions and delve deeper into the roots of a problem, but in method it
reduces to the methods of the other two. Feminism can bring about an
awareness of the pervasiveness of gender and the links between gender
and other forms of oppression, but in actually carrying out the research
program, the methods reduce to some form of naturalism (quantitative information and surveys) or interpretive methods (interviews, focus
groups, and participant observation) or both.
What was said above regarding the question of different methods can
also be said for the question of quantitative methods. Though traditionally feminists have rejected quantitative methods, for similar reasons as
did interpretive and critical theorists, there has been an increased interest in mixing methods and looking for causal regularities in feminist
research. Many more social scientists are seeing the utility of knowing
rates of divorce or family violence or sexual assault in order to make
cases for services, illustrate to the public and funding agencies the seriousness of feminist claims, and empirically prove that women have
been systematically discriminated against in various ways. Rose argues
that the dichotomy between qualitative and quantitative methods
is too simplistic and may be counter productive. While epistemological differences are real, and do lead to different
types of questions being asked in relation to the same broad
research topic, many of the standard dichotomies become
214
quite blurred when placed under closer investigation. This

opens up the possibility of developing research strategies
that recognize the potential complementarity of certain quantitative and qualitative techniques. (Rose (2001), 4)
As Ive stated above, complementarity was Braybrookes argument
nearly fifteen years earlier. Further, as feminist researchers resistance
to quantitative methods fades, Rose argues it is possible to adopt quantitative techniques (that is, methods in the narrow sense) without buying
into all of the tenets of positivist epistemology associated with quantitative methodology in the large sense (12). Braybrooke and naturalists
would concur, Im sure, but is this view tenable given feminist concerns
with objectivity and universality?
Philosophers like Sandra Harding would probably still disagree about
the question of a unity of methods in the social sciences and particularly
the use of the scientific method. Harding is an advocate of feminist
standpoint theory and has dismissed feminist empiricism as unable to
overcome the androcentric bias inherent within the scientific method.
I turn to her work now in greater detail and hope to show how Braybrookes arguments can withstand her critique of traditional social science.
Harding rejects objectivism because of the dispassionate, disinterested, scientific knower and his value-free, genderless, objective scientific procedures (Harding (1996), 302). She thinks science devalues
anything that doesnt take an inherent point-of-viewlessness. She rejects interpretationism as too relativist because, in her analysis of interpretive theory, conflicting interpretations become equally defensible
and because they dont recognize the existing power relations of male
dominance (303). Neither school, she argues, works for feminists, not
even an explicitly feminist empiricism. Feminist empiricists or feminist scientists have argued that the androcentric bias in some science
projects is because it is badly done science and that stricter adherence to the scientific method will overcome these biases in the knower
(305). It is not the method that is the problem; it is the researcher himself who has not been able to filter out his androcentric biases or stereotypes in the interpretive stage of the research. Harding distinguishes
215
between the spontaneous feminist empiricists of the 1970s with the

more sophisticated philosophical feminist empiricism discussed below
(Harding (1993), 51). Harding (and many others who advocate feminist standpoint and the critical theorists before them) argues that the
scientific method cannot overcome the problems of its so-called objectivity and universality. It is an illusion to think that science can remove
bias with a transhistorical, unitary individual knower (Harding (1996),
308), because science has not been particularly welcoming to issues of
race, class or cultural differences in women as subjects of knowledge
that is, between women as agents of knowledge (307).
Instead, Harding advocates feminist standpoint, taking as a starting
point the experiences of women to develop potentially more complete
and less distorted knowledge claims than do mens experiences (309).
For example, looking at mens work can provide only partial, distorted understandings of the nature of work. Because there is a fault
line between womens real experiences and the dominant conceptual
schemes, phenomena like housework wont fit traditional definitions of
work or leisure and therefore should be analysed through concepts of
womens experiences (310). Standpoint overcomes these problems by
starting from marginalized lives and taking everyday life as problematic (Harding (1993), 50). The scientific method is too weak to detect
sexism, so stronger standards for good method are needed, ones that
can guide more competent efforts to maximize objectivity (52). She
takes from intellectual history the ideas of Hegel (master-slave) and
Marx (bourgeois-proletariat) to start from the voice of marginal groups
(53-4). In this way, her views parallel the ideas of critical theory, as
outlined by Braybrooke. Since societies are stratified by race, class,
and gender, the activities of those at the top both organize and set limits on what persons who perform such activities can understand about
themselves and the world around them (54)essentially, the Marxist critique of ideology as stated by Braybrooke. Putting women at the
centre of analysis will lead to less distorted accounts of those women,
according to Harding, because starting at the bottom of social hierarchies can provide starting points for thoughtfor everyones research
and scholarship from which humans relations with each other and the
216
natural world can become visible (54).

Though I havent done her ideas justice in such a short treatment, the
main problem with her work is her claim that standpoint is not relativist
(the interpretive view that we cant judge between conflicting claims) or
essentialist (the postmodern assertion that we cant generalize) (Harding (1993), 61-2). She spends much of her later work (until Harding
(2004)) defending her theory against the claims of postmodernists that
by giving up the goal of telling one true story about reality, one must
also give up trying to tell less false stories (Harding (1996), 314). And
here lies the contradiction: She doesnt want to abandon objectivity
since she wants to reject relativism. As she states, standpoint theory
does not advocatenor is doomed torelativism. It argues against the
ideas that all social situations provide equally useful resources for learning about the world and against the idea that they all set equally strong
limits on knowledge (Harding (1993), 61). She doesnt want to say
that your account is as good as mine, especially if your account is androcentric. More controversial, and harder to sustain within her own
account, is her argument that some social situations are scientifically
better than others as places from which to start off knowledge projects
(61). But what makes one situation scientifically better than another?
On what basis does one make this judgment without relying on some
form of empiricism? How do we judge between different accounts and
avoid the problem of essentialism, that is, making assumptions about
groups of people (women, aboriginals, disabled) that they share essential qualities? How do we avoid the hierarchies of oppression set up
by standpoint (which oppression are we privileging: race, class, or gender?), and how do we avoid idealizing oppression of different groups?
(On (1993)). Here Harding reaches an impasse and argues for strong
objectivity, making the context of discovery part of the research and,
therefore, acknowledging ones own subjectivity to make one more objective. Strong objectivity requires that the subject of knowledge be
placed on the same critical, causal plane as the objects of knowledge.
Thus, strong objectivity requires what we can think of as strong reflexivity (Harding (1993), 69). Strong reflexivity means ensuring that
the underlying assumptions and positions of both researchers and re-
217
searched are observed and reflected upon. The subject of knowledge

becomes part of the object of knowledge and the context of discovery
becomes part of the method itself (70).
But is this really incompatible with feminist empiricism? How can
we have the notion of strong objectivity without recourse to some form
of empiricism? And how is strong objectivity not intimately connected
to the individual knower, as in feminist empiricism? As Rose puts
it: feminists who work with quantitative methods also want to redefine objectivity in terms of the need to make ones position known
rather than invisible, and by limiting claims to universal applicability of
findingswhether these stem from quantitative or qualitative research
(2001, 6). Harding, however, explicitly rejects the work of philosophers of science like Helen Longino and Lynn Nelson (Harding (1993),
51). She argues that though they offer sophisticated and valuable feminist empiricist philosophies of science, they are not really empiricists
because they accept ideas that would be anathema to traditional empiricists, such as the inescapable but also sometimes positive influence
of social values and interests in the content of science (51). Perhaps
Harding should read Braybrookes account of the changes within naturalism or look more closely at Longino and Nelson.
Helen Longinos work suggests that we should detach knowledge
from an ideal of absolute or unitary truth (Longino (1993), 114). Like
Braybrookes recognition of the limits of naturalism, she uses the semantic or model-theoretic view of science and in very similar terms
as Braybrooke. Comparisons are drawn between the real world and
the theoretical world, and metaphors and semantics are used to assist
with the understanding. The adequacy of a theory conceived as a
model is determined by our being able to map some subset of the relations/structures posited in the model onto some portion of the experienced world (115). Thus, various sub-communities within a larger
(scientific or social scientific) community will create numerous theories, models, and ideologies. Knowledge becomes active, not static, and
multiple ways of knowing are validated (Longino (1993, 1996)).
Lynn Nelsons work on epistemological communities could also
be valuable to the acceptance of feminist empiricism (Nelson (1993,
218
1996)). She argues that communities construct knowledge because communities are prior to individuals. What I can know is only what we know
(Nelson (1993), 124). She draws on Quines work on naturalized epistemology to show how radically interdependent methods and knowledge are, and how we begin knowledge with the historical, social, and
scientific practices of a community. She argues that knowledge is socially constructed and constrained by evidence (129). Her example of
man-the-hunter theories is illustrative here. Quoting Longino, when anthropologists or archaeologists have examined chipped stones and then
theorized that the stones were used by the men for hunting (as opposed
to the women for gathering), they are filling in the gap between theory
and data with their own assumptions, stereotypes, and biases about the
relations between men and women (143-4). There is no direct evidence
for either theory. Therefore, we have to make gender relations part of
the research project itself. Her conclusions suggest that we do not need
to reply on one timeless truth even as we demand more empirically
adequate knowledge (151).
Similarly, Richmond Campbell and his work on naturalized epistemology would be helpful to Harding, as he seems to accept her view that
the influence of feminist values can make the process of testing more
likely to track the truth and hence more objective than it would otherwise be (Campbell (1998), 2-3). He wants to give a realist conception
of objectivity [that] is compatible with feminist political goals, that, in
fact, requires them, and he doesnt want to reject the idea of truth or the
possibility of impartial inquiry (6). What he does that she doesnt (and
probably should) is accept that values and knowledge can be socially
constructed and objective. For example, dont feminists want to be able
to say that women are oppressed by such and such and heres how? That
womens subordination exists and is wrong (socially constructed and
objective)? (2). Campbell, similar to Braybrooke, recognizes there is
a corresponding interdependence between facts and meanings and that
meaning and value cant be ascertained independent of each other (3).
Many of the arguments he develops over the course of the book align
with Braybrooke and would probably help Hardings own arguments:
political values dont make objective inquiry impossible; science is not
219
always value-neutral; realism (a world existing independently of how

we think of it) can be reconciled with the belief there isnt one true
description of reality; and finally, as Ive outlined above, even realists
can see inquiry as socially constructed and value laden (2). His naturalized epistemology would recognize the social and reflexive nature
of knowledge (4), and would reinforce and extend the present feminist critiques of androcentric science and the fact/value dichotomy but
it promises to do so by contributing to a politically useful account of
objectivity that is uncompromising in its realist implications (2). But
for the realism, this sounds a lot like Harding.
Ironically, Harding may herself be moving in this direction. In her
most recent anthology (Harding (2004)), she seems to be suggesting
that perhaps epistemological relativism is not the horror that was previously thought. She gives four reasons why relativist fears can be
set aside (not that feminist standpoint is not relativist, which she has
argued in the past) (11). Similar to Braybrooke (and Campbell), Harding argues that just because a research project was shaped by values or
interests doesnt mean that empirical or theoretical quality of the research is necessarily contaminated (11), which seems quite different
from her earlier writings on androcentric research projects. Second, she
argues that claims of any sort only [have] meaning in some particular
cultural context, which is certainly an interpretive claim that she has
previously dismissed. Third, she recognizes that we all have to make
choices between value-laden and interested claims and yet we gather
all the information we can from every kind of source available, weigh
it and tentatively choose (11). Im not entirely sure how this helps her
argument but I think she means that even if it is relativist, we still act,
and therefore judgments and decisions are still made because of relativist information. We would regard as mentally disturbed someone
who let himself be paralysed by relativist considerations (11). Finally,
and most importantly for the purposes of this paper, we need to work
out an epistemology that can account for both this reality that our best
knowledge is socially constructed and also that it is empirically accurate (12), which resonates with Longino, Nelson, Campbell, and Braybrooke. Maybe there is a unity after all.
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8.5
Conclusions
In this chapter, I have tried to show how Braybrookes work has influenced the development of the philosophy of the social sciences and how
it has paralleled certain feminist critiques of science, social science, and
epistemology. Braybrooke argues that there is a unity of method in
the social sciences, and I would argue that though a debate still goes
on in some circles, many feminists accept that claim as well. He gives
good grounds for not dismissing quantitative methods out of hand, and
shows how both can and should be used in research projects. He recognizes the changes within naturalism and the natural sciences, which
would make feminist criticisms of the fact-value dichotomy more mainstream than before, and less problematic for the dilemma of relativism.
The complementarity between naturalism and interpretive theory resonates with the multi-methods of feminists, and a naturalized feminist
epistemology would go some distance in addressing standpoint theorists concerns about the philosophy of social science. Though not his
definitive words on the subject, Im sure, Ill leave the final words for
Braybrooke:
Once the relations within and between the schools have been
assessed again, with the lessons about postmodernism allowed for, the relations can be described as relations of inquiries
inquiries concerned with rules, concerned with regularities,
concerned with texts, concerned with subjective experience.
If one likes, the distinction between the schools, having served
all the purposes mentioned, can then be left behind as a historical curiosity. (Braybrooke (1998b), 840)
Chapter 9
Empathy and Egoism

S UE C AMPBELL
Abstract
In Natural Law Modernized, David Braybrooke raises the important question of why default egoismthat is, egoism as the default account of human motivationcontinues to dominate the imagination of philosophical
ethics. In this paper, I use recent work by Braybrooke and by Nancy Sherman to argue that reliance on moral sentiment theories can re-inscribe
egoism in accounts of moral motivation that attempt a more social starting place, and that this re-inscription blocks our understanding of group
identifications. Default egoism slips into Braybrookes own account of
motivation with his use of Humean moral sentiment. Braybrooke, however, also offers a naturalistic picture of our moral development as persons, which picture is independent of his use of moral sentiment theory.
Braybrookes conception of moral education does dislodge default egoism, and I highlight the conception of persons that allows him to move
away from egoism.
9.1
Introduction
An admirable feature of the political ethics of David Braybrooke is his

insistence on a resolutely social starting place for ethics: the conviction that core questions in ethical theory concern and are addressed to
members of communities who share or can be educated to share an interest in communal thriving. The conviction is evident in his attention
221
222
CHAPTER 9. SUE CAMPBELL
to needs as the human imperative to which our political proposals ought

to respond (Braybrooke (1987a)), and in an account of moral motivation which supports the centrality of meeting needs in his work. To
wit, Braybrooke contends that the rational egoist of traditional ethics
is a philosophical golem who distracts theorists from deriving a sound
account of moral motivation as founded in fellow feeling and shared
purposes. Our relationships exhibit mutual commitment transcending
the demand that others be able to make a productive contribution to
a society of mutual advantage, and a complete ethics needs to discern
from whence this commitment derives (Braybrooke (2001), 199). Braybrooke writes:
The party that wants to found ethics on rational egoism asks
this, without any conviction that it can be answered, or even
needs to be, as a question about how the commitment can
be added to rational egoism as something that goes beyond
egoism. The party that does not believe in rational egoism
as a foundation for ethics thinks the question needs to be
answered, but may understand it in the same way, assuming
that rational egoism is at the very least the default case of
(mature) human motivation and that we need an explanation
of how anything more generous in motivation appears ... It
is not rational egoism, however, that comes first, or serves as
the default case. (199)
Braybrooke in fact contends that as persons are socially shaped towards engaging in common projects and thus towards sharing interests,
egoism would have to be understood as, at best, a degraded form of
human motivation.
I share Braybrookes commitment to an account of moral motivation
grounded in an understanding of persons as shaped through their communal lives. P sychological egoism is implausible as a description of
a widespread psychological orientation. There thus seems little reason
to defend egoism as the best that we are capable of morally. More to
the point of Braybrookes remarks, I believe that habitual philosophical
engagement with egoism is not a good use of time for theorists like my-
9.1. INTRODUCTION
223
self who are concerned with issues of group hierarchy, group conflict,
and the need to theorize cosmopolitan alternatives to present relationships of group exploitation and harm. Braybrooke raises the important
question of why default egoismthat is, egoism as the default account
of human motivationcontinues to dominate the imagination of philosophical ethics.
A number of ethical theorists have seen our emotional capacities for
empathy or fellow feeling as an alternative to grounding ethics in our
undoubted capacities for self-interest. In this paper I test Braybrookes
insights and concerns about default egoism against two such theories of
moral motivation. I draw the first from recent work by prominent virtue
theorist Nancy Sherman (Sherman (1998b); ?). The second account is
Braybrookes own, from Natural Law Modernized (2001). Both Sherman and Braybrooke have insisted that philosophers move away from
an exclusive focus on reason and pay more attention to emotion in accounts of moral motivation. Indebted to the history of moral sentiment
theories, both focus on human capacities to sympathetically engage with
others feelings and argue that our sociable capacities befit us to support
the good of others.1 I pose a potential dilemma for Sherman and Braybrooke: highlighting our capacities for fellow feeling in order to direct
an alternative to an ethics of self-interest may simply continue to reinscribe egoism as the default case of moral motivation.
I use Shermans work on empathy and cosmopolitanism to highlight
and expand on the importance of Braybrookes concerns about default
egoism. Shermans theory of empathy represents persons as egoists in
ways that conflict directly with the empirical research on which she relies. Default egoism is an assumption of her view. Braybrookes insight
is that default egoism thwarts our attempts to properly conceive the conditions of communal thriving. Sherman offers empathic altruism as a
solution to egoism; in her theory, however, it is merely egoisms Janus
face. I shall argue that the motivational frame of egoism/altruism both
fails to capture our collective identifications and blocks attention to their
presence. If we do not understand these identifications, there is no possi1 Sherman defends the possibility of moral cosmopolitanism; Braybrooke defends the more
modest possibility of a widespread commitment to common goods.
224
bility of offering a normative ethical theory that can support communal

thriving.
Shermans theory is an instructive case study of the kinds of conceptual and metaphorical structures in which accounts of empathy and
fellow feeling tend to be embedded and which make egoism difficult
to dislodge. I shall show that default egoism in fact slips into Braybrookes own account of motivation with his use of Humean moral
sentiment. Braybrooke, however, also offers a naturalistic picture of
our development as persons that is independent of his use of moral sentiment theory. I argue that Braybrookes conception of moral education
does dislodge default egoism, and I highlight a very different kind of
representation of the self implicit in his thinking.
I offer two preliminary remarks to clarify the scope of this paper.
First, philosophers distinguish between different kinds of commitment
to egoism in a theory of moral motivation, and I am interested in only
one type. Philosophers have distinguished between advancing the descriptive claim that people act in predominantly or wholly self-interested
wayspsychological egoismand the normative claim that only actions which maximize self-interest are right and/or rationalvariously,
ethical and rational egoism (Feinberg (1978); Shaver (1998)). Commitments to psychological and normative egoism are closely linked. A
description of people as predominantly egoistic places pragmatic limits
on what can be expected as ethical or rational action, and a defence of
ethical or rational egoism typically depends for its plausibility on the
assumption that people are predominantly psychological egoists. Sherman and Braybrooke are interested in deriving normative ethical positions via realistic naturalized accounts of human motivation. I thus take
them to be primarily denying that people are predominant psychological
egoists.2 The relation of empathy to psychological egoism (to which I
refer simply as egoism) is the focus of this paper.
Second, in assessing feminist challenges to the contracting individual of traditional Western political theory, Genevieve Lloyd argues that
the exercise of imagination is often central to challenges to moral the2 Braybrooke explicitly denies the normative claim that rational action is co-extensive with
self-interested action, but does so by showing the implausibility of psychological egoism.
9.2. SHERMANS ACCOUNT OF EMPATHY
225
ory (Lloyd (2000), 113). Lloyd points out that when we confront a familiar theoretical model of the self with an undertheorized area of experience, we often become aware of the inadequate fit between the model
and experience. This dissonance can make salient certain unexamined
features of our models of the self and press us towards understandings
more adequate to the experiences we are discussing. My intent is to
make salient how we represent or imagine persons as egoists through
accounts of empathy and fellow feeling, and to use Braybrookes work
on moral education to suggest an alternative.3
9.2 Shermans Account of Empathy

In recent work, Nancy Sherman seeks a naturalized approach to moral
motivation at once sensitive to the rigors of a philosophical account and
respectful of the increasing empirical evidence we have of how we are
constructed as psychological creatures (?, 109). She argues that our
capacities for empathy provide an alternative or additional basis for a
cosmopolitan ethics to that offered through Stoic or Kantian conceptions of a universal moral community founded on reason: Studies suggest there are more ubiquitous and fundamental ways we step beyond
our egocentric perspectives. These involve empathy and its precursors
... What seems increasingly confirmed is that we step out of our egocentric, and by extension, culturally parochial worlds through mechanisms
such as empathy (Sherman (1998b), 80-1).
The concept of empathy has developed through a long and complex
theoretical history, and Sherman makes considerable use of this history
to explain empathy and map its variations. What seems central to empathy throughout its lineage is the somewhat vague idea of being able
to take on anothers perspective to a situation and thereby respond as
3 This paper is generally indebted to Lloyds work. It is also indebted to Khadija Coxons
work on empathy (Coxon (2003)). Coxon advances the interesting position that focus on empathic
accuracy as the primary problem for empathy theory is in fact symptomatic of a non-relational
understanding of persons. The focus assumes that others thoughts and feelings are fully formed
and there for us to take up or ignore and does not attend to how our efforts to understand others may
shape their experiences and subjectivities. Following Coxons lead, I am concerned in this paper
not with empathic accuracy but with broader moral considerations involving how we conceive
people through theories of empathy and fellow feeling.
226
they are responding or would respond. Adam Smith, Shermans preferred touchstone, writes: By the imagination we place ourselves in
his situation ... we enter, as it were, into his body and become in some
measure the same person with him; and thence form some idea of his
sentiments, and even feel something which, though weaker in degree, is
not altogether unlike them (Smith (1759), 47-8, quoted in ?, 88).
There are two familiar aspects to Smiths attempt to make concrete
empathy as a mechanism for gaining access to others thoughts and feelings: an offer of spatial metaphor involving change of location (we
enter, as it were, into his body) and reference to the human capacities
or tendenciesin this passage, imaginationwhich might defend the
appropriateness of such metaphors. The dual way of concretizing empathy occurs throughout Shermans account. On the one hand she refers
to empathy as a kind of active transport (?, 87). On the other, and crucially given her commitments to a naturalized moral psychology, she
offers an extensive survey of recent empirical work on childrens capacities for motor mimicry, shared attention, and imagination, specifically
role-playing.
For example, three-day-old neonates can and do mimic mouth opening and tongue extension, as well as the crying of similarly aged neonates. Children and their caretakers engage in mimetic synchronies,
picking up shared rhythms of behaviour (?, 104). Moreover, children
are robust pretenders, and this, Sherman writes, undoubtedly contributes to their learning to role play in a way required for understanding
others beliefs (106). Sherman takes the studies she surveys to support
claims about the biological nature of our empathetic capacities and the
ubiquity of our empathetic responses. In addition, Sherman refers to
studies that allegedly support the thesis that empathy predisposes us to
sympathy towards others and thus motivates us to behave altruistically.
Altruism is sometimes understood as acting on others interests in ways
that compromise ones own welfare. Sherman uses the term to mean
simply that we act on others interests while putting aside our own. This
latter use is relatively standard in philosophical texts that contrast egoism and altruism, and I follow it in this paper.
Finally, there is a distinction in Shermans work between two modes
9.3. DEFAULT EGOISM IN SHERMAN
227
of empathic engagement, which distinction is important to understanding her representation of the empathic self. In imagining Ellas situation, for example, I might try to imagine myself as Ella, attempting to
grasp her response through an act of self transformation. Alternatively,
I might imagine myself in Ellas situation, an act of projection, then
analogizing from my own response to Ellas likely response. This latter
mode of inference remains empathy-like in its objective of trying to gain
access to others perspectives in order to share and thus understand their
responses. Sherman allows a greater role for projective empathy than
most theorists yet concedes that this mode may at best give us information about how we ourselves would respond to a situation. Transformative empathy remains Shermans ideal of empathetic engagement, a
normative heuristic for our empathy projects, and she suggests our early
capacities for mimicry can be seen as its developmental building blocks
(101-2).
Sherman joins a number of other recent theorists in hypothesizing
that empathy is a fundamental way of understanding others. She suggests that the empirical work she discusses gives credence to claims
that empathy grounds our ability to form shared conceptions, to form
attachments with others, to achieve the self-knowledge that comes from
understanding how we are seen, and the self-esteem that comes from
feeling understood ((1998a), 84). Most important, empathy should hold
pride of place in our accounts of moral motivation. Through empathetic
engagement we overcome both egoism and cultural parochialism and
develop altruistic tendencies that extend beyond family, associates, and
fellow citizens to those outside our borders (Sherman (1998b), 103).
9.3
Default Egoism in Sherman
Notable in Sherman are persistent and unreflective references to egoism

and altruism as the frame both for understanding the nature of empathy and for persuading us of its moral importance. To use Braybrookes
language, Shermans project is to understand our commitments to others, and she sees this task as one of describing how our commitments
transcend or go beyond egoism. Sherman argues that empathy is the
228
primary way in which we move from an egoistic perspective to a more

generous altruistic one. Because altruism is the motivational structure
through which Sherman understands our will to be other-interested, research into our empathetic capacities so as to encourage their development is key to normative ethics. I thus take Sherman to be committed to
default egoism in an account of moral motivation. Note that we move
from an initial, presumably natural egoism to a developed altruism. I
now sketch some of the ways in which egoism creates problems for the
coherence of her account and subverts its objectives.
Most strikingly, though the importance of empathy allegedly derives
from the necessity of overcoming egoism, Shermans description of empathy undermines her supposition that we are egoists. Sherman commits herself to a strong position on the epistemic function of empathy. It is, she suggests, a primary way of understanding others minds;
from the age of five on, we empathize with others in our daily intercourse with them in order to explain and predict their behaviour. On
Shermans view, the egoist could not get on in the world at all, as such
a person would not be able to understand or predict the behaviour of
those around her. Shermans account arguably renders egoism impossible. Yet, in Sherman, it is the morally problematic place of our naturally
egoist perspective to which the moral importance of empathy answers.
What I take to be an incoherence in Shermans accountthat egoism
is necessary to generate our commitment to empathy theory, but is not
tenably maintained in the face of that theoryobviously threatens one
of her objectives. We cannot understand how empathy responds to the
problem of egoism if our natural tendencies to empathize make egoism
a psychological non-starter.
It is important to note that we have no reason to suppose that any account of the empathic egoist would be similarly incoherent. The problem in Sherman is clearly tied to her epistemic use of empathy as our
primary mode of access to others minds. The problem does serve to
focus our attention squarely on egoism and to compel us to ask why it
is there as an assumption. In other words, the uncomfortable role of
egoism in Shermans account can show us why default egoism can be
so difficult for empathy theorists to avoid. Before turning to this issue, I
9.3. DEFAULT EGOISM IN SHERMAN
229
will outline what further damage egoism does to Shermans aspirations.

Sherman postulates that through empathy we can overcome our tendencies towards cultural parochialism and, thus, move towards moral
cosmopolitanism. Sherman uses the phrase cultural parochialism to
gesture towards the morally problematic aspects of our collective lives
that come from identifying too exclusively with the interests of those
whom we take to be similar to ourselves. Some philosophers have worried that empathy exacerbates rather than ameliorates parochialism, a
possibility of concern to Sherman:
There is one final point of linkage between empathy studies and moral theory that needs to be discussed. And this is
the theme I began with, of cosmopolitanism. Can empathy
break out beyond parochial boundaries of similarity and familiarity? ... In the end, do we merely trade egocentrism for
ethnocentrism, or something like it? (?, 113)
The important discussion is never held. Because egoism is structurally situated as the primary problem for moral motivation, the problem of parochialism is simply deferred. It is Shermans final point of
linkage and she addresses it by noting that these are complex matters,
but empirical studies can further advance our understanding (113).
There are also serious and subtle ways in which default egoism
misleads us about the problematic dimensions of our collective identifications. Because Sherman positions egoism as the default case of mature human motivation, egoism is the core motivational structure from
which other problematic psychological tendencies are held derivative.
It is thus an assumption of Shermans view that cultural parochialism is
an extension of egoism. We have no reason to accept this assumption.
As egoism itself has no real descriptive grounding in the account, it is
not available to explain group allegiance. Without some understanding
of the problem to which empathy responds, there is nothing on which to
rest the claim that empathy will ameliorate parochialism.
Relatedly, as Sherman pictures individuals as egoists, they are without complex motivational structures derived from their relations to others. Imagining culturally parochial worlds as extensions of egocentric
230
worlds homogenizes the character of cultures, distracting our attention

from their internal complexities. The term cultural parochialism itself paves over differences within culture. When Sherman talks of the
will to ally with those outside our borders, she neglects the existence
of group hierarchy and harm that is internal to complex and diverse societies. I call these problems serious and subtle because I do not think
theorists have properly seen that the tendency to homogenize group life
is sometimes linked to beginning a discussion of moral agency from
the standpoint of the egoist individual. I will have more to say about
this tendency when I examine Shermans imagery and when I turn to
Braybrookes account of moral education.
Finally, psychological egoism is a theory of individual moral psychology. Joel Feinberg made the point decades ago that the assumption
of universal psychological egoism leaves us without a way to make a
distinction between people who really are selfish and those who are not
(Feinberg (1978)). Shermans claim that parochialism is an extension
of egoism may lead us to think that group selfishness is as universal
as the individual egoism from which it somehow derives. Shermans
account displaces our attention from the real global problem of moral
selfishness which resides largely in the consumerism, greed, and will to
exploit others manifest in Western nations and which requires an analysis of distinctive group characteristics and relations.
Shermans strong endorsement of an empathy-based account of moral
motivation is obviously and explicitly programmatic in intent. This
is not the basis of my criticism. My concern is that normative ethics
should respond to a description of real moral concerns. Default egoism takes up a place in Shermans account that should be occupied by
an account of the real-world harms and injustices for which empathetic
engagement with others might be a helpful response. David Braybrooke
writes: In the world at large, the excesses of group feeling are far more
destructive of ethics than the excesses of self-interest. In the face of
these excesses, philosophers and moralists are arguing for a possibility
of moral community that often fails to be realized, sometimes it seems,
on every hand (Braybrooke (2001), 146). Sherman offers us no insights
into moral failures that derive from our allegiances. Unlike the golem
9.4. IMAGINING EMPATHIC SELVES
231
of default egoism, these allegiances are very clearly a problem for the
cosmopolitan ethicist and they take forms whose variety can only be
obscured by the claim that when we see how empathy can help us transcend egoism, we will see that it can help us with parochialism. I take
Shermans inability to deal at all realistically with group identifications,
allegiances, and hostilities to be the most serious cost of default egoism
in her account. Whether Braybrooke can deal realistically with these
allegiances will be a test of his account.
The unstable positioning of default egoism in Shermans account,
and the problems it causes both for coherence and the promise of an
approach to ethics that highlights our capacities for empathy, raise the
question of why she is committed to egoism/altruism as a conceptual
framework for thinking about empathy. Is there something about Shermans understanding of empathy that tends to drag egoism in its undercarriage? It is important to address this question if we are to avoid the
common philosophical tendency to re-inscribe egoism in our theorizing.
9.4
Imagining Empathic Selves
Like most philosophers, Sherman pays little attention to the metaphors

through which empathy is concretized. The history of describing empathy is strikingly spatial, and Sherman depends on this history as a primary way to locate and elaborate the concept of empathy and to mould
her distinctive use of it for moral cosmopolitanism. The metaphors
involve both change of place and the idea of empathy as overcoming
distance. I suggest these metaphors reinforce a dichotomous motivational structure of self-interest versus otherinterest that leaves egoism
in place.
Many theorists have described taking on others perspectives as a
change in location. Adam Smith described what he called sympathy as a case of trading places with others in fancy. One then brings
the case back to ones own bosom, comparing the others feelings
and thoughts, available through sympathy, to ones own, and judging
the appropriateness of the others responses (Smith (1759), 141, quoted
in ?, 89). Edward Titchener, who first used the term empathy, con-
232
ceived it as an exploration of foreign environments: as we read about

the forest, we may, as it were, become the explorer; we feel for ourselves the gloom, the silence, the humidity, the oppression, the sense of
lurking danger; everything is strange but it is to us that strange experience has come (Titchener (1915), 198, quoted in Sherman (1998b),
110). The psychologist Carl Rogers, who developed empathy theory
as a therapeutic model, spoke of entering the private perceptual world
of another and becoming thoroughly at home in it . . . To be with another in this way means that for the time being you lay aside the views
and values you hold for yourself in order to enter another world without prejudice (Rogers (1975), 4, quoted in ?, 92). Sherman herself
links the development work that she surveys to a five-year-olds ability
to make accurate predictions of others behaviour through metaphorical description that continues the theme of changing place: Five year
olds can put themselves in someone elses shoes. In figuring out others
behaviour, they can leave behind the egocentric point of view ... This
developmental transition is important, because it marks the milestone at
which we break out of our egocentric world, and begin to see, in a substantive way, through others eyes (Sherman (1998b), 112-13). Many
metaphors of change of place, Titcheners for example, also involve a
sense of distance, and Sherman often adds the connotation of distance
to her descriptions by characterizing the places visited as alien and remote. She comments, for example, that several points indicate widely
held views about empathy in the clinical domain. First is the metaphor
of empathy as perceiving anothers mind in a way that allows one to
become familiar with its alien habits and terrain (?, 92).
The possibility of transformative empathy that is Shermans normative heuristic is made concrete through the idea of a change of place.
Empathy as active transport is conceived as leaving the self, pictured
as one spatial territory, in order to enter a second self conceived as a
different spatial territory: a body, environment, world, pair of shoes, or
pair of eyes. I can achieve anothers perspective because in empathizing
I have left behind the values and responses that characterize my own
perspective and might, if carried with me, bias an empathic encounter.
The spatial metaphor of leaving oneself to occupy another is not in-
9.4. IMAGINING EMPATHIC SELVES
233
dissoluble from empathy as a concept, as some empathy theorists have

modelled what Sherman refers to as a projective rather than a transformative ideal. However, Shermans use of this metaphor to support a
transformative ideal makes it difficult to avoid the conceptual frame of
egoism/altruism. On Shermans model, self-interests are placed in one
world bounded and distinguished from a second world characterized by
the others interests. When we engage someones interests through empathy, we transport ourselves to them, leaving our interests behind. This
picture leaves egoism and altruism, traditionally conceived as being
self-interested versus being other-interested in a way that excludes selfinterest, as the most tempting frame for conceiving the interest structure
of empathy. Any serious moral engagement with others interests means
leaving the self and its interests behind, so the basic egoist individual,
one characterized solely by self-interest, is embedded in empathy as its
starting point.
Sherman utilizes the spatiality of empathy to make it seem especially
suitable to moral cosmopolitanism. Sherman describes moral growth
as a matter of moving steadily outward from the ego/self towards family, friends, countrymen, and finally the distant others beyond our borders, first gaining access to their interests through empathy and then
being moved to action. C ultural parochialism is a result of empathys
not being sufficiently far-flung, and Sherman urges us to overcome
this distance: the remoteness of a culture ... may not weigh heavily
against understanding the shared dimensions of human suffering and
loss (Sherman (1998b), 113).4
Shermans exploitation of distance allows us to press further on the
inadequacy of her treatment of group affiliation. The distance that empathy metaphorically traverses makes it seem like the problem to which
our ethics must respond is a lack of engagement with others rather than
relations that exploit and harm them. Moreover, the metaphor of distance fixes our attention in the wrong place, away from our local inability to treat others well and thus it contributes to the homogenization of
cultures in her account. Many of the harms that result from our group
allegiances and identificationsthe harms of racism, sexism, ethnocen4 Far-flung
is how Sherman characterizes moral respect.
234
trism, homophobia, and so onare harms to those with whom we are

in daily contact in diverse societies. The representation of the spatial
self imported through empathy obscures the often destructive role of
our collective identifications, specifically issues of group hierarchy in
diverse societies.
9.5 Moral Sentiment

I have used Shermans work to illustrate the force of Braybrookes concern about the tendency to understand moral commitment in ways that
leave egoism intact. Although Sherman is committed to a naturalized
account of moral motivation that shows how we develop towards sociability and concern for others, the egoist is firmly entrenched in Shermans view through spatial metaphors for empathy that offer self-interest
versus other-interest as the only options for moral motivation. Through
spatial metaphor we gain a representation of persons as originally egoist
and at a distance from others. Moral growth is seen as the problem of
engagement achieved through sympathetic altruism.
Although moral sentiment theories are by no means the exclusive
home of spatial metaphors for the self, Adam Smith is the primary
philosophical influence on Shermans account of empathy, and Smith
and Hume are key reference points in the history of the concept. I now
turn to Braybrookes endorsement of Hume to raise my caution about
the legacy of moral sentiment theory. Braybrooke musters Hume in
support of his interesting thesis that the natural law tradition he defends
has had a robust presence in the history of modern ethics. He also uses
Hume to develop his own attention to emotion in the theory of moral
motivation and he implies that Humes theory of moral sentiment is
compatible with his own account of moral education. I will go on to
suggest that Braybrookes imagining of the self is very different than
Humes.
In both the Treatise and the Inquiry, Hume defends versions of the
thesis that people are naturally disposed to sympathy with others, and
in accordance with this concern, moved to support whatever is useful to
them (Braybrooke (2001), 129). Our approval of what benefits others
9.5. MORAL SENTIMENT
235
is referred to by Braybrooke as the sentiment of humanity or humane

feeling. Because the sentiment of humanity is universal (common to all
and extending to all) and directed to what is useful for others, it seems
particularly suitable to an account of motivation that makes a case for
our capacity to support communal thriving.
There is a great deal of commentary and dispute about the best account of both humane feeling, the Humean moral sentiment, and of
the sympathy on which it is based. Humes account of sympathy (his
contribution to empathy theory) suggests that when we are in the presence of anothers passion, we form such a lively idea of it as becomes
the passion itself (Hume (1978), 575). Commentators have struggled
to make sense of this mechanism. My interest here, however, is not in
exegesis of Hume but in how Braybrookes reading of Hume represents
moral agency. In Hume, capacity for humane feeling may be hampered
either by self-interest or partiality for family and friends, or by a distance from others in time and space that challenges the possibility of
sympathy. Developing the sentiment of humanity requires compensating for these tendencies.
On Braybrookes reading, self-interest and partiality are compensated for by our trained capacity to assume a fully disinterested perspective, that is, to bracket or put aside self-interest. Distance remains
a problem (Braybrooke (2001), 146). The mechanism of fellow feeling requires real spatial contiguity, and the extension of fellow feeling
to those at a distance is, as Braybrooke acknowledges, perhaps never
made adequately viable in Humes account. Nevertheless, Braybrooke
expresses optimism about Humes account of human feeling. With
hearts and minds unclouded by self-interest or partiality for family and
friends, we feel for the sufferings of people long ago or on the other
side of the planet; and correcting our judgements to take into account
the distance, we find those sufferings a great deal more important than
a transient scratch on one of our fingers (131).
I do not know for certain how committed Braybrooke is to Humes
sentiment of humanity, but, with Hume, Braybrooke assumes the familiar picture of the egoist self moving through distance towards others via
the development of sympathetic bonds, first easily to family and friends,
236
finally with more difficulty to distant others. First, we find again the immediate separation of self-interest from other-interest. We are moved to
support what is useful to our fellows when [our] own interest is not in
question (Braybrooke (2001), 129). Braybrooke implies that our interests will either conflict with others interests or lead us to be indifferent
to others. Second, we put aside our own interests in order to assume
the perspectives of others. The sentiment of humanity depends on our
being normal human beings, fully equipped with the capacity to feel in
a disinterested perspective (139).
Finally, because distance attenuates sympathy, we are reinforced in
the idea that the main impediment to communal thriving is disinterest
in distant others, a preference for our near and dear. Humes moral
sentiment theory does not involve trading places in imagination. But it
does continue to represent the egoist self as at a spatial distance from
others, moving towards them through bonds of sympathy. Moreover,
Humes use of distance takes on a metaphorical cast. He remarks that
we sympathize more with our acquaintances than with strangers; with
our countrymen than with foreigners, but given his account of fellowfeeling, we should sympathize equally with all who are spatially contiguous to us, be they strangers or friends (Hume (1978), 580). Felt
separateness from others becomes troped once again through the notion of spatial distance. Humes account may at best explain why we
must make exceptional effort to become emotionally engaged with distant others, but not why those spatially contiguous to us, who may differ
from us in class, ethnicity, religious affiliation, sexual orientation, and
so on, do not have our sympathy.
Joan Tronto has argued that if we think of the actual historic context of moral sentiment theory, it is not odd that the sympathetic self
and the egoist self are reciprocally reinforcing representations. In the
eighteenth century Europe saw significant transformations in collective
life. While humans grew more distant from one another and the bonds
between them became more formal and more formally equally, they
also had to expand their gaze beyond the local to the nation, and indeed
sometimes to the global level (Tronto (1993), 31). Because of the erosion of close communal forms of life, the strength of self interest as a
9.6. COMMON PURPOSE AND RELATIONAL INTERESTS
237
regulator of human activity became increasingly powerful (50). The

metaphor of overcoming distance had a multi-layered significance for
moral sentiment theorists. On the one hand, it spoke to the loss of communal forms of life whose regulatory function was being replaced by
accounts of enlightened self-interest; on the other, of the need to engage
with a wider range and variety of people and moral contexts.
Sherman and Braybrooke both draw on the tradition of moral sentiment theory to find a description of moral psychology that is realistic
and optimistic about our sociability. Both objectives are to some degree
thwarted by their use of a tradition preoccupied by the representation of
the self as at a distance from others, an egoist capable of fellow feeling.
9.6
Common Purpose and Relational Interests
The description of empathy as distance-reducing and as thereby encouraging other-directed interests is so familiar as an account of moral sociability that we may wonder what our options are. In the chapter on
moral education in Natural Law Modernized, Braybrooke elaborates
an account of universal childrearing that shows how we develop into
persons via our enlistment into common projects and purposes. I shall
argue that Braybrookes account of moral education offers us the option of relational interest as well as an account of human development
that supports its centrality. In the final section of this chapter, I align
his writing with recent feminist accounts of the self and emotion to argue that it provokes and requires a very different kind of philosophical
imagining for the self than that found in moral sentiment theory, one
more adequate to theorizing group hierarchy in complex cultures.
Like Shermans, Braybrookes theory of motivation is modestly naturalized. But it is an account of our natural capacities as trained. Braybrookes theory of motivation is a description of moral education, an
account of how children are raised to be sociable in ways that may lead
them to support rules and laws that have as their end the good of the
community. The core of the account is that, universally, we raise children to be persons by continually enlisting them in joint activities. The
success of these cooperative activities requires that the participants de-
238
velop mutual intentions and commitments towards a common end, understood as the good of that activity.
Briefly, parents and other caretakers initially give significance to the
innate responses of their infants; that is, they attribute to their infants
desires, intentions, frustrations, and so on, and do so in order to devise
patterns of interaction that will eventually make room for the child as a
partner. As the child develops, the child and the adult come to rely on
each other to fulfill their responsibilities in the partnership. Braybrooke
writes:
Children, like dogs and horses, can normally rely on commitments forthcoming from their mentors in return for the
commitments that they themselves make. If Kate desists
from throwing her porridge upon the floor, she will be left
to eat in peace; it will be supplied in due quantity at due
times. If Frank stays out of the street, the walks to the park
will continue. Moreover, when things are working well, the
commitment leads to achievement of common goodsthe
Common Good of each joint activity or ritual: Both mother
and child act with the object of having the child regularly
fed under a form of civility that both respect; both father and
child act with the object of walking to the park and doing so
in decent order and safety. (Braybrooke (2001), 204)
Through these common activities, childrens needs are met in ways
that enlist them into partnerships in which they share intentions and
goals with others. Children develop not only pride in themselves for
their contributions, but also trust in and concern for their partners, a
valuing of mutual pleasure in the success of realizing shared intentions
and interests, and cooperative dispositions towards other such activities.
Parents and children have interests in common, but these interests
are also shared interests. Braybrookes description of types of interests
through which infants are eventually socialized into persons is not to be
confused with a familiar philosophical picture of parallel but solitary
interests served by a common scheme of cooperation (64), that is, of
self-interested individuals who act together in narrowly pragmatic ways.
9.6. COMMON PURPOSE AND RELATIONAL INTERESTS
239
Participants in a shared activity take on responsibility for their contribution to the activity and hold themselves to be answerable to others
for their contribution. But they also often take some responsibility for
the contributions of others. They develop mutual care and concern for
each other through their interactions and develop emotional dispositions
that take as their object the activity as shared. For example, they take
pleasure in shared achievement. Finally, they have a commitment to the
shared activity. To think of my interests as parallel rather than shared
suggests that when my hypothesized solitary interests would clearly be
better met by an alternative arrangement, I would shift to that arrangement. But my commitment to a shared activity may make me reluctant
to undertake such a shift. Put simply, if Franks father is sick and cannot
go to the park, Frank may well decide to stay home and keep him company instead of going for his walk with someone else. As I understand
Braybrooke, the responsibility, emotion, and commitment that characterize shared interests are neither conceptually nor developmentally independent. The emotional attitudes developed in the course of shared
activitiesfor example, Franks concern for his fathers well-being
are partly constitutive of our having shared interests and commitments
and act as evidence of them.
Braybrooke is aware that too much of a disposition towards cooperativeness can lead to exploitation and that a sensible upbringing will
encourage independence and autonomy as well as cooperativeness. But
independence and autonomy are not conceived as deriving from egoism: the point of departure . . . is not a person who is bifurcated between being sociable and being self-striving . . . The independence will
be an independence that has a cast reflecting the development of cooperativeness (207). I gloss this remark by pointing out that our independence and autonomy as persons are cultivated in the kinds of developmental partnerships that Braybrooke describes. Braybrooke also allows
that persons have egoistic as well as cooperative tendencies, and that a
healthy adult community will include parallel interests.
What Braybrooke insists on is that the kind of engagement in joint
activities that he describes, engagement through which we develop as
persons, puts the partners to the activities outside of egoism in their re-
240
lations with each other and in their commitments. Braybrookes account

of the fundamental basis of our capacity to care for each others interests
does not incorporate egoism as one of its stages. In other words, though
Braybrooke responds to egoism, this response does not re-inscribe egoism within his view of motivation. Shared interests will form a dominant
part of most individuals motivational matrix. Developmental activities,
role-related activities, activities in institutions like sports or the military
that specifically inculcate shared interests and emotions that bind participants, activities in which we participate as friends and lovers, and
communal endeavours that continue over some period of time, can all
be expected to give rise to such interests.
Over the last two decades, feminist theorists have elaborated an account of persons as relationally constituted, as developing in and through
their relationships with others. They have focused on how the facts of
our interdependence should cause theorists to reconceptualize human
capacities and values. Braybrookes work makes a distinctive contribution to this body of theory by attending to motivation. Braybrookes
focus on shared interests forces us to see that we must look to collective structures and activities first in order to talk about an individuals
agency. This point can be sharpened by looking at a similar suggestion.
Elliot Sober and David Sloan Wilson, in their classic study of altruism, recognize that egoism or altruism may be too spare a binary for
thinking about the structure of human motivation and propose an alternative, relationalism, as a way to think about many of our desires:
Relationalism is the view that people sometimes have ultimate desires
that certain relational propositions (connecting self and certain others)
be true (Sober and Wilson (1998), 226). Sober and Wilsons wording,
in response to classic formulations of egoism, is somewhat awkward;
however, a great many of my desires are clearly relational under their
description. I want it to be the case that the apples be divided equally
between us, that I be a trustworthy mentor to my students, that our department excel at undergraduate teaching, that Jan and I have a good
dinner tonight and a good trip to Australia in Novemberin general,
that we achieve certain objectives through activities that I participate in
as a member of various formal and informal partnerships and collec-
9.7. RE-IMAGINING THE SELF
241
tives. Nevertheless, Sober and Wilsons use of desire to sketch an alternative to egoism/altruism leaves open the possibility of an agent with
solitary interests in the context of shared activity. Braybrooke offers
a model where the motives of individual agent derive from the shared
interests formed through their collaborations with others.
9.7 Re-imagining the Self

To use the felicitous phrasing of Genevieve Lloyd, Braybrooke forces
the philosophical imagination to run from the collective to the individual, rather than, as is more common, the reverse. Lloyds writing on
re-imagining the self can help us see that this move allows quite a different model of the self than that complicit with default egoism, and I use
her work to more sharply distinguish the view of the self adumbrated in
Braybrooke from that involved with default egoism. Lloyd talks about
two levels of experience that the shift in imagination highlights: the
specific experience of taking oneself to be bound up with others when
we act and the complex experience of subjectivity that results from our
shared activities over time. She writes that spatial metaphors are powerful in our prevailing political ideals of selfhood, helping to reinforce
the grip on the philosophical imagination of the sharply bordered individual (Lloyd (2000), 121). But such models are an ill fit with the
experiences she describes.
One of Lloyds striking illustrations of feeling bound up with others
involves Pat Barkers fictionalized account of poet Siegfried Sassoons
return to the front in the First World War. In the first novel of Barkers
Regeneration trilogy, Sassoon no longer supports the war and is able to
avoid returning to the trenches. His decision to return cannot be understood, Lloyd thinks, as either egoism or as patriotic altruism. Instead,
she writes: Solidarity with the dead sustains the characters sense of
self, and with it a responsibility to those ... doomed to death: The
Battalion in the Mud,
Out of the gloom they gather about my bed
They whisper to my heart, their thoughts are mine.
242
Why are you here with all your watches ended?

From Ypres to Frise we sought you in the line.
In bitter safety I awake, unfriended. (117)
The poem is by the historic Sassoon. Lloyds point is that to try and
pry apart self-concern or interest from other-concern or interest in order
to give one or the other explanatory priority would violate the character of Sassoons experience of selfhood. She writes that Sassoon acts
out of a sense of himself as bound up with others, in ways that resist
clear-cut divisions between self and other. [His] taking of responsibility
is explicable only through relations that forge identities, in situations
where there can be no clear cut distinction between self and other, between egoism and altruism (117). Sassoons identity is that of a friend,
an identity forged through the joint project of men trying to keep each
other safe in battle. This is not a project that can be described as having
parallel but solitary interests in safety that are best met by joint activity,
or we would have no explanation for why Sassoon returns to the front.
Lloyd picks an example of shared interest that some might read as
involving action in a context of extremity. Braybrookes account of
moral education provides the basis for understanding the experience of
feeling bound up with others when we act and take responsibility as
an ordinary and familiar part of our moral lives. Like many ordinary
features of our lives, it may only become phenomenologically apparent
when it becomes a site of tension, when particular shared interests seem
to conflict with our own welfare or with the welfare of others. Sassoons
shared interests threatened his own survival, and friends urged him not
to return to the front. A way of thinking about at least some cases of
enmeshment, or over-identification with others, is as situations in which
our shared interests may come to conflict with what is best for others.
Though philosophers rarely discuss enmeshment as a moral problem, it
is common in those relationships, like parent/child or mentor/student,
in which more senior partners must eventually shift out of the joint activities that have characterized the relationship and allow those younger
to take control.5 Though such examples bring shared interests to the
5 For some discussion, see Stocker and Hegeman (1996); Piper (1991). Sherman makes reference to Pipers work (Sherman (1998a)).
243
fore as a point of tension, they can help us see the wide base of shared
interests out of which we act.
Philosophers who want to defeat the egoist have sometimes imagined this figure as a psychopath,6 but this imagining has been not been
effective in locating and dislodging default egoism, the kind of egoism
of Shermans theory that is compatible with the claim that people arent
really egoists because they have transcended egoism. To think about
our experience of self and agency in ways made possible by Lloyd and
Braybrooke gives us a better way to ask what we are imagining when we
understand persons through a motivational structure of egoism/altruism.
The interest structure offered by egoism/altruism and offered in Shermans account of empathy gives us a portrait of people who have the
capacity to sharply distinguish self- and other-interest in ways that fail
to reflect common experiences of self and moral agency.
The alternative model of motivation that I have forefronted in Braybrooke becomes richer when we follow Lloyds advice and move explicitly from picturing selves spatially to explicitly contemplating the temporal dimensions of selfhood. Like Braybrooke, Lloyd regards taking
on responsibilities and forming bonds of identification, bonds through
which our interests become shared, as reciprocal movements in our development as persons. But she would argue that Braybrookes account
of moral education gives only a snapshot of human sociability; it captures at a time an ongoing process of developing allegiances that shape
ones sense of self. We may think of this process narratively. We come
to think of ourselves as persisting subjects by interpreting and appropriating the events of our pasts through narratives about who we are and
why we acted thus (Schechtman (1996); Walker (1998b)). Many of
these narratives will, like Sassoons, be narratives of relation, and each
of us will have many such narratives. The fact that a self is intrinsically
something that has a past means that there is an internal multiplicity to
selfhood (Lloyd (2000), 122). Lloyd affirms with Braybrooke that the
formation of selves is a collective matter (118) but adds that we must
understand persons as bearing this complexity in the way that they experience their identities, responsibilities, interests, emotions, and oppor6 See,
for example, Thomas (1980)
244
tunities for agency. We thus no longer have a picture of moral progress

as one of moving outward from a self that has a uniform motivational
structure to engage with the interests of similar others, which interests
are kept distinct from self-interest on pain of empathic bias.
It should be clear that this relational model of the self renders Braybrookes additional use of Humes moral sentiment theory retrograde.
Braybrookes reading of Hume offers the options of self-interested or
otherandnotself-interested, excluding room for the very forms of relational desire that are so important in the account of common purpose
and moral development. Moreover, for Hume, normal moral agency
requires that we can clearly distinguish our own self-interests from others interests. I have suggested, however, that Braybrookes account of
moral education leads to a view of self whose interests are bound up
with those of others in ways that call into question how far we are capable of distinguishing our own interests from those of others, especially
given the complexity of our relational development over time.
The alternative, relational representation of the self that I have tried
to make vivid through Braybrooke and Lloyd, does, I think, offer opportunities to better understand the moral problems of group hierarchy
in complex and diverse cultures. First, in recognizing that individuals
themselves have complicated relational identities, we will not inadvertently homogenize cultures by imagining them (as Sherman does) as
extensions of single egocentric worlds. Second, Braybrooke and Lloyd
encourage us to think of how individuals motivational structures are
shaped through collective purposes and interests in ways that depend on
and shape their emotional development. They stress that our coming to
feel certain ways is interwoven with our engagement in joint activities,
and the emotional dimension of our engagement is part of what constitutes shared interests. When we picture the self as sharply bordered and
at a distance from others, our attention remains on the development of
sympathythe question is how a self becomes engaged with the interests of others. The focus on sympathy, moreover, tends to bring with it
this view of the self. If we view the self as shaped already through collective activities and common purposes, we do not have the bare egoist
self for whom the main challenge is one of engagement, and we can turn
245
our attention from sympathy to the wider range of emotions that play a
role in our group life.
Margaret Urban Walker has argued, for example, that our emotional
responses form one of the primary ways in which we are collectively
shaped to maintain political hierarchies (Walker (1998a)).7 She draws
attention to the work of Lillian Smith, an anti-racist activist in the
American south in the 1940s and 1950s. In her autobiography, Killers
of the Dream, Smith writes, I do not think our mothers were aware that
they were teaching us lessons. It was as if they were revolving mirrors
reflecting life outside the home, inside their memory, outside the home,
and we were the spectators entranced by the bright and terrible images
we saw there (Smith (1950), 83). These words, which invoke Lloyds
account of our complex subjectivities, are part of Smiths introduction
to The Lessons. In this chapter, Smith details how white southern children learned lessons about cleanliness, food, sin, and sexuality in ways
interwoven with training in racial segregation:
The lesson on segregation was only a logical extension of
the lessons on sex and white superiority and God. Not only
Negros but everything dark, dangerous, evil must be pushed
to the rim of ones life. Signs put over doors in the world
and over minds seemed natural enough to children like us,
for signs had already been put over forbidden areas on our
bodies ... Each lesson was linked on to the other drawing
strength from it. (90-1)
Moreover, these lessons involved the inculcation of emotional responses that would maintain this segregation as a joint activity of white
southern culture. The mother who taught me what I know of tenderness
and love and compassion also taught me the bleak rituals of keeping Negros in their place (27, quoted in Walker (1998b), 70).
The emotional responses that characterize racist and ethnocentric hierarchies often have nothing to do with physical distance or emotional
disinterest, but shape hierarchy in the context of proximity. David
7 have previously linked Lloyd and Walker (Walker (1998a)) on this point in Campbell (Camp-
bell).
246
Haekwon Kim argues that contemporary racial segregation in the United

States is maintained through a structure of white contempt for racial others (Kim (1999)). Kim describes this contempt as a sense of offence at
the base and potentially debasing qualities of those racialized (111).
The response to this threat is the reinforcement of hierarchy and status,
and this can take a variety of collective forms. Kim does use spatial
language to describe the kinds of status preservation that ward off the
debasing contagion of the contemptible: avoidance, marking a boundary, fending off, circumscribing (112). Kims work suggests that our
felt separateness from others should not be taken as a sign that we are
natural egoists who need to move outward to a collective. We may instead be expressing our emotional training in collective purposes. In
other words, when we are inclined to describe persons as bounded and
at a distance from others, this tendency should direct us to the specific
modes and contexts of socialization that reinforce alienation from, distrust of, or contempt for certain others, often those close by. Walker,
Smith, and Kim gesture further in the direction that Braybrooke and
Lloyd take us. Though neither Braybrooke nor Lloyd completely escapes the traditional focus on collective bonds as sympathetic bonds,
together they provide a model of the self that allows for a sophisticated
treatment of the links between joint interests and emotional development.
In this chapter, I have strongly affirmed Braybrookes concerns about
default egoism in moral theory that tries for a more social starting point.
While I endorse Braybrookes and Shermans rehabilitation of the emotions in models of moral motivation, I have questioned whether privileging empathy or fellow feeling is a good way to add needed complexity to these models. Braybrooke and Sherman are both indebted
to the history of moral sentiment theories in formulating their accounts
of empathy. Though this chapter leaves open the possibility that not
all theories of empathy re-inscribe egoism, Braybrookes work stimulates us to scrutinize these theories for the problematic assumptions that
they may embed. Genevieve Lloyd comments that there is no one right
model of the self but that we must work back and forth between our
experience and our models to find ways of theorizing adequate to the
247
present context. I suggest that the empathic egoist is too oldfashioned

a self for the challenges that now inform our reflections on moral motivation and that Braybrookes writing on moral education describes a
more useful alternative.
Chapter 10
The Problem of Moral Judgement

R ICHMOND C AMPBELL
Abstract
Is moral judgment a state of belief or a state of feeling and desire? Cognitivists about moral judgment answer: true or false belief; non-cognitivists
answer: feeling and/or desire. What is at stake in this disagreement is the
possibility of moral knowledge, for if moral judgment is not a state of
true or false belief, it cannot embody moral knowledge. Those who defend the possibility of moral knowledge, however, face a dilemma. They
must reject, on pain of inconsistency, one of two plausible Humean views:
(1) that moral judgments themselves contain motivation to act, or (2) that
motivation cannot arise from belief alone. In Natural Law Modernized
David Braybrooke portrays Hume as defending the possibility of moral
knowledge, thus apparently committing Hume to an inconsistent triad of
propositions. This essay defends a novel interpretation of moral judgment as a complex, hybrid state of belief and feeling/desire that would
undermine the long-standing dichotomy between cognitivism and noncognitivism and demonstrate how Braybrookes understanding of Hume
does not lead to inconsistency. In doing so, the essay attempts to bring out
the moral significance of the underlying false opposition between reason
and emotion that has been with us since Plato and continues to bedevil
contemporary moral theory.
I am grateful for the extensive comments on an earlier draft provided by David Braybrooke,
Rochney Jacobsen, Duncan MacIntosh, William Rottschaefer, and Susan Sherwin.
249
CHAPTER 10. RICHMOND CAMPBELL
250
10.1
The Problem
Is a moral judgment a state of belief or a state of feeling and desire?

We speak, reason, and feel as if a moral judgment can embody moral
knowledge. We thus imply that moral judgment is a state of belief. If,
for example, I say, It was wrong of you not to tell her that you are married, and you reply, Thats true or I know that, you imply agreement
in belief. Yet at the same time our judgments convey negative feelings about, and even motivation to refrain from doing, what we judge
is morally wrong. Yours convey feelings of regret, the desire not to repeat the mistake; mine convey feelings of disapproval and the desire to
persuade you not to repeat it. Such are part and parcel of the judgment
that one of us has acted wrongly. In sum, a moral judgment appears to
be belief and desire, belief and feeling, at once. But is it really possible
that a moral judgment can be belief and desire, or belief and feeling?
Humean considerations argue against this possibility. Famously Hume
maintained that morals move us and excite our passions, while judgments of fact, in themselves and apart from what we desire and feel,
are inert. Put into contemporary terms, the argument derives from the
following inconsistency. For the reasons just given, we may be inclined
to hold:
1. Moral judgments are (or express)1 states of belief;
and also
2. In making moral judgments, people feel the force of moral norms
that guide their judgments and are thereby moved (to some degree) to act in accord with them, independently of any antecedent
desires or feelings that they may have.
Yet, according to a widely accepted view of motivation,
3. Beliefs never motivate just by themselves; instead, beliefs move
us in combination with antecedent desires and feelings.
1 Judgment can refer to a mental state or an utterance expressing it. This essay focuses on
the first case, but in What Is Moral Judgment? I argue that the cases are parallel.
10.1. THE PROBLEM
251
Since these views together lead to contradiction, (2) and (3) provide
a Humean argument for rejecting (1). If moral judgments are intrinsically motivating [by (2)see Hume (1978), 413-18] but beliefs are not
[by (3)455-76], then moral judgments cannot be beliefs [contrary to
(1)].
The inconsistency, however, also constitutes a problem with the concept of moral judgment, since each of the three views has merit on its
own. View (3) is embedded in the dominant and widely shared beliefdesire theory of action, according to which both belief and desire are
needed to explain behaviour. I might believe that food is before me but
without any desire to eat. The fact of my belief by itself will not predict my eating. On the other hand, if I desire food but do not believe
that food is before me, the desire by itself will not predict my eating.
In general, only the combination of belief and desire can predict and
explain behaviour on this theory. View (2), that moral judgments carry
with them their own motivation, is equally plausible. I might desire to
do what is right for extrinsic reasons, say to protect my reputation, but
thinking something is right is, it would seem, motivating just in itself.
Unfortunately, views (2) and (3) entail that my thinking something is
right cannot be a belief that it is right and hence that view (1) must be
false. But to reject (1) is surely contrary to common sense. It appears, in
sum, that one of these views must be wrong, yet it is hard to understand
how any one of them can be given up.2
In his Natural Law Modernized David Braybrooke proposes to interpret David Hume as a natural law theorist and thus as a philosopher
committed to the possibility of moral knowledge (Braybrooke (2001),
130-5) and therefore the truth of (1). It is clear that the problem just
posed is as pressing for Braybrookes Hume as it would be for any
philosopher who defends the possibility of moral knowledge. Indeed, it
is more so, since Hume endorses the very propositions that seem inconsistent with that possibility! Is Braybrookes non-standard interpretation
of Hume incoherent in light of this apparent inconsistency?
2 Michael Smith (Smith (1994)) formulates a closely related problem in terms of rational
belief and motivation. See my What Is Moral Judgment?Campbell (2005) for how it bears on
this problem.
252
In this chapter I argue that it is not, since moral judgments may be

construed as embodying two different functions, as beliefs representing
possible moral truths and as emotion-laden motives to act. This account of moral judgment developed in my Illusions of Paradox (Campbell (1998)) is close to Braybrookes understanding of Humes theory.
While he concedes that Hume may be read as rejecting the realist proposition that moral judgments can embody moral truths, he contends, with
some plausibility, that Humes theory of morals is best interpreted as
being at bottom realist. My aim will not be to defend Braybrookes
interesting reading of Hume (though I hope to indicate why it is plausible), but to explore whether a hybrid conception of moral judgment can
be defended on its own merits and to bring out its significance for the
underlying false dichotomy between reason and emotion that has been
with us since Plato and continues to bedevil contemporary moral theory.
10.2
Moral Realism: The Default Position
I will be assuming that moral realism, the position that moral knowledge is possible, is the default position in moral theory. Moral realism
agrees with common sense and is backed by powerful theoretical considerations that are well developed in the literature (see, e.g., Copp
(1995), 15-19). For example, moral realism simplifies our understanding of logical inference in moral reasoning by allowing us to apply the
standard of truth preservation for valid inference. It also adds coherence to our understanding of normative claims in general, such as claims
about validity of inferences or mistakes in language. We think we know
that some inferences are valid, that some uses of languages incorrect,
despite the evident normative character of these claims. Why should
normative claims in morals have a different epistemological status from
normative claims about logic and meaning? Braybrooke presses similar questions in his article What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative
Answer to the Open-Question Argument Leave to Moral Judgments?
Braybrooke (2003c)
Critics of moral realism attempt to counter these defences and to
raise objections of their own. Space does not permit even cursory dis-
10.2. MORAL REALISM: THE DEFAULT POSITION
253
cussion of all the main lines of objection to moral realism, though I have
reviewed them elsewhere (Campbell (2003)). Here I confine myself to
objections that bear on the central problem for moral judgment just outlined. Prominent among these objections is Mackies charge that moral
judgment is subject to systematic error, with the result that all moral
judgments are false (Mackie (1977)). Clearly, if Mackies error theory
is true, moral realism cannot be. His theory is that moral judgments are
about facts that are intrinsically prescriptive and as such imply what is
highly implausible from a scientific perspective. Moreover, nothing in
science would explain how we could know such facts. For these reasons
commonsense moral thinking is dubious metaphysically and epistemologically. Does Mackies theory serve to reinforce the doubts just raised
about the coherence of moral judgment?
The inconsistency among (1), (2), and (3) is more reasonably viewed
as being as much a problem for Mackies theory as it is for moral realism. The reason is just that his theory is committed to the same three
inconsistent propositions. His theory entails that moral judgments are
false; hence, his theory entails that moral judgments are beliefs rather
than merely states of desire or feeling. Moreover, his theory does not
deny either that moral judgments are intrinsically moving or that the
leading scientific account of motivation is true. Indeed, his theory implies that even if no intrinsically prescriptive facts exist, we are moved
in judging that they exist and he believes that we should accept what
science says about motivation. Thus, he is committed to (2) and (3) as
well as (1), at least until science offers a better account of what moves
us to act. In sum, he shares with moral realism the central problem with
moral judgment outlined above.
Moral realism has, of course, other ways to address Mackies objection. It can, for example, deny that moral realism entails a commitment
to intrinsically prescriptive moral facts. Naturalistic forms of moral realism attempt to do precisely that. Nevertheless, even if they can succeed (as I believe they can), the central problem remains a problem for
moral realism. Moral realism seems committed to (1), since it is hard to
see how there can be moral knowledge without moral belief. It must,
therefore, reject either (2) or (3). It must, that is, answer Humes argu-
254
ment from (2) and (3) to the denial of (1). The next two sections will
consider two approaches prominent in the literature on moral realism.
10.3
Externalist Moral Realism
The externalist moral realist rejects (2) in favour of (1) and (3). Why
reject (2)? The standard answer, perhaps best developed by David
Brink (Brink (1989)), is that we can easily imagine someone who judges
something to be morally wrong but just doesnt give a damn. Not only
can we imagine such a person, sociopaths exist who apparently agree
that what they want to do is wrong but feel no compunction about doing it. Then there are ordinary folks who at times feel no inclination to
do something that on balance is right from their point of view, such as
rendering a small courtesy. How can moral judgments be intrinsically
motivating in the face of these cases? The standard reply in defence of
(2)the internalist replyis that the cases are described incorrectly.
The person who doesnt give a damn doesnt really believe that the act
in question is wrong (or right). Instead the person thinks that the action
is wrong (or right) only in the non-literal sense that this is what most
people regard as wrong (or right).
Admittedly, it may be difficult or even impossible to settle this dispute, since the cases present conflicting evidence about which description is correct. The person says one thing but the persons behaviour and
feeling are reason not to treat what is said as being intended literally.
The externalist, however, provides a way out. She can present a positive
account of how motivation arises in cases of moral judgment without
necessarily conceding that (2) is true. An example from Braybrookes
discussion of natural law theory illustrates how such an account might
unfold. According to this theory, to judge something to be morally unacceptable is to judge it to be contrary to rules that must be obeyed by
and large in order for members of society to thrive (Braybrooke (2001),
3). The concept of thriving, let us suppose, can be given empirical content through reference to meeting basic human needs, say according
to Braybrookes theory of needs (Braybrooke (1987a)). Thus, on this
understanding of what is meant in judging something morally unac-
10.3. EXTERNALIST MORAL REALISM
255
ceptable, activities like mugging, fraud, and extortion would be judged

morally unacceptable, since they would violate norms that enable a society to thrive. Indeed, on the theory of natural law that he defends, we
know that these kinds of behaviour are wrong. But in knowing this must
we be motivated not to engage in these kinds of actions?
According to the externalist the motivation and the belief are distinct
logically and in fact but are linked together causally, for contingent reasons, for example concerning human nature. Let us suppose with Hume
that most of us are moved by considerations that impinge on the wellbeing of others, especially when our own needs are not so pressing as
to prevent us from having a clear view of the needs of others. Suppose,
that is, that we have the sentiment of humanity, to use Humes phrase. In
that case, normally we will be moved to some degree by what we judge
morally because of our independent interest in the thriving of people in
general. Notice that the reason that we would be moved is that we have
an antecedent desire that people thrive and our moral belief, on Braybrookes theory of the content of moral belief, informs us of the means
to achieve that end. No entailment is assumed between having a moral
belief and having a desire to be moral. Moreover, the states in question
are distinct. We care about whether moral rules are obeyed because we
care about the consequences of their being obeyed for the thriving of
society. For these reasons we will react negatively when others flout the
rules and feel badly when, yielding to temptation, we do what we know
to be wrong. The position is, therefore, a moral realist position that is
at the same time externalist regarding moral motivation. It endorses
propositions (1) and (3) but rejects the internalist position contained in
(2).
The difficulty with this story, and indeed any account of moral motivation that is inconsistent with (2), is that it does not fit with what
we know about moral development. As children we learn morals by
learning how to feel about certain ways of acting and how to behave
in accordance with those feelings. In other words, we learn how to be
moved by moral considerations directly. We learn to desire not to do
certain things and to feel badly when we do them or see others do them,
and also to desire to do other things and to feel good about doing those
256
things. We learn, that is, how to be motivated intrinsically by moral

considerations. This fact about moral development is exactly in accord
with (2).
Furthermore, we do not first learn some highly theoretical beliefs
about the relation between, say, obeying rules and thriving and then, because of our antecedent desires and feelings about matters contingently
connected with these beliefs, come to be motivated to act and to feel appropriately. Not only is such an account of moral development far from
what we know through casual observation and scientific study, it is also
contrary to the way moral sensibility would have evolved according to
our best understanding of the evolution of morals. Moral sensibility, in
order to exert immediate and powerful control sufficient to counter contrary impulses, could not have developed in such an indirect way. Setting aside hard cases where moral feelings pull in opposite directions,
countless other cases make us react immediately and unreservedly, just
as one would expect if (2) were true. In the hard cases, we are unable
immediately to make a moral judgment, but when we are able to make
the moral judgment, we normally are disposed to feel, desire, and act
in characteristic ways just in virtue of making that judgment. An adequate view of the relation between moral judgment and motivation must
account for this fact.
10.4
Internalist Moral Realism
The defender of (1) and (2) must reject (3). The difficulties facing those
who take this option are equally grave. One that has been mentioned
already is that (3) is part of a well-established theory of motivation according to which beliefs motivate only when coupled with desires. As
McNaughton puts it: Desires without beliefs are blind; beliefs without desires are inert (McNaughton (1988), 21). Many would say that
this understanding is part of our folk psychological theory of why we
do anything. It is this theory that is reflected also in Bayesian models
of rational decision-making. There subjective probabilities of possible
outcomes stand in for degrees of belief that those outcomes will result
if a given decision is taken and individual utilities of outcomes stand
10.4. INTERNALIST MORAL REALISM
257
for the degree of preference for those outcomes relative to alternatives.

Although there is no consensus as to the best theory of motivation, no
other approach is so well entrenched in ordinary thinking or in efforts
to represent motivation mathematically. To reject (3) is to fly in the face
of this formidable tradition.
An even more serious difficulty arises from elements in the internalist realism that appear to be incompatible. Consider the precise sense
in which the internalist realism, in accord with (1), implies that a moral
judgment is a state of belief. A moral judgment is to be a state of belief
as distinct from a state of emotion, desire, or attitude. Though the latter
can have a cognitive element (the object of the emotion can engage our
cognitive faculties), it is only belief that can be fully cognitive in all essential respects. This position is often characterized by our saying that
the moral judgment or claim is purely cognitive. Consider the following passage from McNaughton, a particularly lucid defender of internal
moral realism (see also Dancy (1993); Platts (1988)):
To be aware of a moral requirement is, according to the realist, to have a conception of the situation as demanding a
response ... The requirement will only be satisfied if the
agent changes the world to fit it. But the realist also wishes
to insist that the agents conception of the situation is purely
cognitive [my italics]. That is, the agent has a belief that he
is morally required to act. (McNaughton (1988), 109)
But now we must ask ourselves how it is possible for a state of mind to
be purely cognitive and at the same time be internally connected to feeling and desire as required by (2), since internal moral realism endorses
both (1) and (2). I want to urge that it is not possible.
Notice that the internalism expressed in (2) does not entail that a
moral judgment is a belief. In fact, expressivists deny (1), but because
they hold that moral judgments are or express states of emotion, desire,
or attitude, they are able to endorse (2). The reason is that by denying
that moral judgments are beliefs, expressionists can have an unmediated
connection between judgment and motivation. (If a moral judgment is,
say, a state of desire, then that desire is internal to the judgment just as
258
a matter of logic.) Internalist moral realism, however, is not in the same

position. It cannot argue that the connection between judgment and
motivation is internal in the same way, for this form of moral realism
requires, as we have just seen, that moral judgment is a purely cognitive
state of mind and thus is not in any part a state of emotion, desire, or
attitude. The state of belief that constitutes the moral judgment must be
internally connected to emotion, desire, or attitude without being itself
an emotion, desire, or attitude.
McNaughton thinks that the internal connection can be made intelligible if we understand that a belief about an object of desire can explain
why the object is desired. He doesnt think, for example, that a saucer
of mud is an intelligible object of desire, given ordinary beliefs about
mud. Those beliefs would not explain why anyone would desire mud.
By contrast, doing what is believed to be morally required is an intelligible object of desire, just in virtue of what we believe about it. What
we believe about it, that it is morally required, explains why we desire
it. In these cases the desire that arises from the belief becomes cognitive
itself and is thus dependent on the belief. McNaughton puts it thus:
The radical upshot of this line of thought is that ... the desire, as an independent element in action explanation, drops
out as redundant. Once we have understood the attractiveness of the desired object, as the agent conceives it, we already understand why he is motivated to act the way he does.
Nothing needs to be added to his conception to complete the
explanation. (113)
Since the desire is not an independent element in the explanation of
motivation and is redundant once the belief is fully understood, it is
possible, McNaughton thinks, to endorse (1) in the required sense
to understand moral judgment as purely belief - and at the same time
endorse (2).
This attempt to explain how desire can be internal to a belief state
that is purely cognitive and hence be itself cognitive trades on an ambiguity. What makes the desire cognitive on this account is the fact that
the object of desire can also be an object of belief. For example, that I
10.5. THE BELIEF-DESIRE THEORY OF MORAL JUDGMENT
259
am helping someone in need can be both something I believe that I am

doing and something that I desire that I am doing. Moreover, I can desire to do what I am doing because it is truly a case of helping someone
in need. I have no quarrel with this conception of the cognitive nature
of desire. It is another matter, however, to claim that the desire is purely
cognitive. What would that mean? It could be purely cognitive if the desire is present solely because of what is believed, independently of any
other desires or feelings, but this understanding of desire is exceedingly
strange. It might be urged that the element of desiring (distinct from
the object of desire) is itself cognitive, but it is entirely unclear what it
would mean for desiring to be purely a state of cognition. Ostensibly,
the desiring taken as a whole is not just a matter of thinking of the object of the desire according to a certain belief. It is the distinct state of
desiring this object. Were that not so, something would be necessarily
desired provided only that one has certain beliefs about it. It would be as
if certain facts about a thing that do not logically entail its being desired
necessitated its being desired just in virtue of their being believed. Such
facts would be akin to Mackies intrinsically prescriptive facts and no
less mysterious.
10.5 The Belief-Desire Theory of Moral Judgment

At this point we need to take stock. The problem is framed between two
major alternative views: that moral judgment is a belief and that moral
judgment is something else, such as a desire, emotion, or attitude. These
alternatives may appear not only to be exclusive but to be exhaustive.
That is, they may appear to be contradictories rather than simply contraries. When judgment is understood linguistically as an utterance or
a written statement rather than as a psychological state, the corresponding views are called cognitivism and non-cognitivism respectively
(Brandt (1959), 205; Sayre-McCord (1988), 1-23). Thus, cognitivism
says that moral claims are true or false and non-cognitivism denies that
moral claims are either true or false. Of course, to say that someones
moral claim is true or false is just to say that it expresses a true or false
belief. Cognitivism and non-cognitivism are, therefore, nothing more
260
than the semantic forms of the dichotomy that generates the problem,
and we can easily reformulate the inconsistent triad of positions in semantic terms (see my What Is Moral Judgment?). Interestingly, the
labels used for the semantic distinction imply that cognitivism and noncognitivism are to be understood as contradictories. We need only add
that the terms internalism and externalism applied to forms of realism are meant to be contradictories too, so that there is no in-between
position possible. Once we have set aside error theory, only three possibilities appear to remain: externalist moral realism, internalist moral
realism, and non-cognitivism. Moreover, each view faces serious objections given the inconsistent triad, since each view must reject a member
of the triad despite the independent support enjoyed by each member.
What is at fault, I now want to argue, is not any of the claims comprising the triad but the underlying framework used to generate the problem. In particular, I contend that contrary to appearances and contrary to
the assumption made throughout a century of meta-ethical discussion,
the view that moral judgments are or express states of belief and the
view that moral judgments are or express states of feeling, desire, and
attitude (non-cognitivism) are either not contraries or else not contradictories. On either alternative the problem of moral judgment dissolves
and room is left for a more adequate understanding of the complexity of
moral judgment. Let me explain.
Once the debate around how to resolve the moral problem moves
beyond simple statements of the competing alternatives, it turns out
that positions corresponding to (1) invariably are interpreted to entail
that moral judgments are or express only beliefs. Positions corresponding to the denial of (1), correspondingly, are invariably interpreted so
that they entail that moral judgments are or express only feeling, desire, or attitude (not belief). The alert reader will already have noted
this phenomenon in the above exposition of the reasons for and against
the main forms of moral realism. Of course, with the key qualification
only made explicit, it is abundantly clear that the positions are contraries and not contradictories. Even though they are officially defined
without this qualification so that the truth of one entails the denial of
the other, with the qualification the situation is logically different. Al-
10.5. THE BELIEF-DESIRE THEORY OF MORAL JUDGMENT
261
though the positions so qualified are inconsistent, they do not exhaust

all the possibilities. Might it be possible that a moral judgment is (or
expresses) not only belief but also feeling, desire, or attitude? This is
a possibility that I will explore directly. Note what happens, though,
if the qualification is dropped so that (1) is read just as stated and its
so-called denial read as the view that a moral judgment is or expresses
feeling, desire, or attitude. Then the positions are not even contraries!
Either way, new possibilities emerge. No longer are we forced to choose
among unpalatable alternatives.
What I propose is that we understand a moral judgment as a complex state (or mode of expression) comprising (or expressing) both belief and desire (or feeling or attitude). I should emphasize that what I am
suggesting is not a variation of expressivism, where moral judgment is
fundamentally a non-belief state that has various cognitive aspects, for
example, a commitment to give a rational justification for that state. Expressivism is still, in traditional terminology, a form of non-cognitivism,
since moral judgments in this view are not states of belief (Gibbard
(1990); Blackburn (1998)). The same can be said for the position that
moral judgments are prescriptions rather than true or false statements
(Hare (1952, 1989)). The view that I am proposing, however, is neither
cognitive nor non-cognitive as traditionally conceived. My position is
that a moral judgment is a fully hybrid state of mind (or mode of expression) that functions normally both as a belief and as a non-belief
state, such as a non-belief state of feeling, desire, or attitude. Take the
judgment that stealing is wrong. Traditionally, a non-cognitivist (e.g.,
Ayer (1936)) takes the judgment to be a combination of a cognitive representation of stealing coupled with a non-cognitive emotional reaction
to what is represented. Though this understanding of moral judgment in
a weak sense combines both cognitive and non-cognitive elements, the
present suggestion is fundamentally different. The cognitive element is
not the representation of stealing per se, but of stealing as being morally
wrong. The judgment that stealing is wrong contains the belief that
stealing is wrong. It follows that the position is not non-cognitivist. On
the other hand, it is not cognitivist, since it holds that the judgment that
stealing is wrong is at the same time normally a state of feeling and mo-
262
tivation. In making the judgment that stealing is wrong, I am disposed

(normally, to some degree) not to steal, to deter others from stealing, to
feel shame, embarrassment, and regret if I steal and indignation towards
others if they steal, and to defend these feelings and dispositions as being justified. All these elements are combined in the moral judgment, at
least in a normal case.
The position advocated here allows an important qualification. These
hybrid elements can pull apart in certain cases. Suppose I am raised to
think that homosexuality is wrong. When I am mature, my attitude
changes; I no longer believe that it is wrong. Yet before I am fully comfortable with this new moral perspective, I may have many of the same
emotional responses that I had before I changed my belief. In short, I
may believe one thing and feel another. On the theory I advocate, this
is not a paradigmatic case of moral judgment. My judgment that homosexuality is not wrong does not contain all the elements that such a
judgment normally would. By the same token, it could be said that I
am still judging it wrong on an emotional level, and that would be true,
even though the moral judgment in this case too does not contain all
the normal elements. Here it is lacking the appropriate belief. In these
respects the theory is like externalist moral realism because it draws
no essential connection between moral belief and moral motivation.
However, it is also like internalist moral realism because in the normal
case, where belief and desire, feeling and belief are present in the moral
judgment taken as a whole, there is a direct and unmediated connection
between the moral judgment and the feeling and motivation that goes
with it. When I make a moral judgment, I am normally motivated to act
and moved to feel just in virtue of making that judgment, independently
of any antecedent feelings or desires. The theory offered breaks down
the externalist/internalist dichotomy. It is easy to see that if this theory
is even roughly on the mark, the problem of moral judgment dissolves.
How it dissolves depends on how view (1) is interpreted. Without the
qualification that makes (1) imply that moral judgment is only a state
of belief, there is no incompatibility between (1) and (2) even when
they are combined with (3). For a moral judgment in being not merely
a belief can easily accommodate (2). Moreover, the implication of (3)
10.6. TWO OBJECTIONS BRIEFLY CONSIDERED
263
that beliefs by themselves are inert creates no difficulty. Though beliefs

are inert by themselves according to (3), moral judgments are not normally just beliefs. As well, the objections raised against external moral
realism and internalist moral realism do not apply, since in each case
those objections presuppose the qualification. On the other hand, if the
qualification is included and made explicit, then it becomes clear that
(1) cannot be true if the hybrid theory is true. In this case (1) can be
rejected without sacrificing moral realism.
10.6 Two Objections Briefly Considered

One objection arises from a distinction made by Anscombe between
two opposite directions of fit ascribed to beliefs and desires (Anscombe
(1963)). Anscombe compares a grocery list with a list made by a detective reporting groceries bought (56). The same list can be the content of
a belief or a desire (that certain groceries are bought). It functions differently depending on whether it represents items desired to be bought
or items believed to be bought. In the first case, what is bought should
fit the items desired to be bought; in the second case, what is believed
to be bought should fit what actually was bought. In short, the world
should fit the desire and the belief should fit the world. The directions
of fit are precisely the opposite, and for this reason when the list fails to
fit what is bought, we blame the detectives list in one case (belief) and
the grocery store in the other (desire).
What might be thought to be objectionable about the hybrid view is
that it requires that a single state of mind comprising both belief and
desire have opposite directions of fit. This worry has been raised in
the literature for internalist moral realism because on this view a moral
judgment is nothing more than a belief, yet it is supposed to function as
a desire as well. Whatever its merits as an objection to that account, it
has no force against the hybrid theory. Let us grant for the sake of argument that beliefs and desires do have opposite directions of fit. What
is missing in the objection is any reason for thinking that because the
directions of fit are different, a state of mind, especially a complex one,
cannot function both ways at once. Consider intention. Arguably, if I in-
264
tend to meet you tomorrow for lunch, I both believe that I will meet you
for lunch and desire that I will (Millikan (1996)). If I dont meet you,
say because I am unexpectedly detained, then there are two separate
failures, one of belief and another of desire, with different implications.
The intention, however, was not impossible. It would be especially odd
to think the difference in directions of fit is a problem for moral judgment, since what is desired on the hybrid account (that we do not steal)
is not the same as what is believed (that stealing is wrong).
Another worry is that I do not specify the content of moral belief.
Notoriously it is difficult to specify the content of moral belief in a way
that will win wide support. Of course, any adequate defence of moral
realism needs such an account. But the point of the present theory is to
offer an alternative framework that resolves the problem of moral judgment. Admittedly, the alternative leaves other matters concerning moral
realism exactly where they were. The hybrid theory is offered as a better analysis of moral judgment. It can be right in this respect even if
moral realism is false. Indeed, the present suggestion actually is compatible with error theory, since the hybrid theory is not committed to
the position that moral beliefs are true. It would be unfair to saddle this
theory with the task of fully defending moral realism. It does, however,
provide an advance over the standard internalist and externalist forms
of moral realism simply because it avoids the inconsistency with which
we began. In the next section, though, I will suggest how the content of
moral beliefs might be specified in a Humean form of moral realism.
10.7
Hume and the Opposition between Reason and

Emotion
We return finally to the interpretation of Hume as a natural law theorist

and hence a moral realist. Can Braybrookes interpretation be reconciled with Humes opinion that morals are based on sentiment rather
than reason? Or with Humes claim in the Treatise that to judge character as virtuous is to have a particular feeling of pleasure that constitutes
our praise and admiration (Hume 1978, 471)? Given his assertions,
Hume may appear to be more naturally read as a non-cognitivist who
10.7. THE OPPOSITION BETWEEN REASON AND EMOTION
265
identifies moral judgment with feeling and desire. In light of the beliefdesire theory, however, it may pay us to take a second look.
Consider first the question whether the belief-desire theory of moral
judgment can be squared with Humes understanding of moral perception and judgment as involving sentiment. We have framed the former
mainly in terms of belief and desire rather than belief and feeling, but it
should be evident that nothing in the structure of the theory proposed or
in the arguments supporting it should stop us from incorporating feeling
and emotion of specific kinds into the dual conception of moral judgment. If I condemn the gratuitous, senseless cruelty of some action, I
not only want it to stop and not to be repeated, but also feel displeasure,
perhaps revulsion and disgust, in thinking about it, and my emotional
reaction arguably is as inseparable from condemnation as my desire to
prevent the action. It is the same when I condemn my own action and
feel shame and remorse for what I have done. These feelings are as
much a part of my condemnation as my desire never to repeat it. We
can of course imagine special cases where we make the negative judgment but feel little or nothing, just as we have imagined cases where the
desire is absent. In the normal case, though, feeling and desire together
go with the judgment.
What about moral belief? The argument can be made that feeling
does not exclude moral belief as part of the judgment any more than
desire does. The hybrid theory accommodates both belief and the combination of feeling and desire. In this respect Humes recognition of
sentiment as part of moral perception is compatible with the alternative approach to moral judgment that I am advocating. Hume did argue
that, since morals excite us to feel and move us to act, morals are not
based on reason, which tells us only what is true or false. But this argument is just the argument, in slightly different words, from (2) and
(3) to the rejection of (1). We have already seen that this argument is
subject to more than one interpretation. If the rejection of (1) is properly interpreted as rejecting the extreme position that moral judgment is
only belief, then the argument is sound but does not establish that moral
judgment does not contain belief in addition to desire and feeling. In
short, Humes argument can be taken to show that morals are not based
266
solely on reason, not that reason plays no part in the content of moral
judgment or in its appraisal. It is true that Hume doesnt explicitly formulate his position in these terms, but it would be uncharitable to saddle
him with the logically stronger, less reasonable position since he does
not explicitly exclude it either.
We should examine, in any case, Humes understanding of moral
judgment when it is couched in the context of his more general theory of morals. Two parts of that theory stand out as directly relevant.
First, Hume holds that the feelings that are internal to moral judgment
are feelings that arise when contemplating the object of those feelings
impartially and therefore are separate from feelings aroused by selfinterest. In a familiar passage Hume writes:
Nor is every sentiment of pleasure or pain, which arises from
characters and actions, of that peculiar kind which makes us
praise or condemn. The good qualities of an enemy are hurtful to us, but may still command our esteem and respect. Tis
only when a character is considered in general, without reference to our particular interest, that it causes such a feeling
or sentiment as denominates it morally good or evil. (Hume
(1978), 472)3
The complementary part is Humes understanding of human nature
such that when we do contemplate aspects of character, bracketing our
own interests, we are in fact moved with pleasure in contemplating those
aspects that are useful to persons (either to themselves or others, either directly or indirectly) and we are moved with displeasure by the
opposite. When the first part, a key ingredient of his theory of moral
judgment, is put together with the second part, his idea of a sentiment
of humanity that is generally shared, the result is a broadly utilitarian
account of moral virtue and vice. Aspects of character that are useful
are judged properly to be virtuous and those that are hurtful are judged
properly to be vicious.
3 See also Humes appendix on moral sentiment in An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of
Morals (Hume (1966)).
267
Braybrooke would question the description of Humes view as utilitarian, since Humes focus is not on maximizing utility narrowly defined, but the issue of what to call Humes view need not detain us. The
understanding of Hume I am proposing is about the status of moral judgment rather than the details of his normative theory. It does not depend
at all on how we interpret usefulness as applied to character. All that is
essential to assume is that the usefulness of a character is real enough
that almost everyone will respond to it positively when they consider it
impartially and the opposite when a character is hurtful. For the sake of
argument, then, let us grant this Humean assumption. What follows for
the status of moral judgment? Can it embody moral knowledge?
My argument in support of Braybrookes reading of Hume has three
steps. The first is to note that Humes understanding of moral judgment,
that it is a feeling of a certain kind, obviously allows the feeling to be
subject to rational appraisal. This can happen in two general ways, as
Hume makes clear. Someone can make the case that the person making
the judgment is not viewing the subject matter impartially. If the feeling
of pleasure or dissatisfaction arises from self-interest rather than from
taking a general perspective, then the feeling is not justified as a moral
judgment. Whether self-interest explains the feeling is, moreover, a factual matter that can be debated on rational grounds. Second, the feeling
can be faulted because it is based on a false view of the facts. The feeling of displeasure can arise from believing that a certain person is in
pain when he is not. Again, the validity of the feeling would be undermined based on a matter to which reason can be applied. No defender
of non-cognitivism should want to deny any of this, since it is all commonplace and doesnt by itself entail that the feeling embodies moral
knowledge.
The second step, however, takes us significantly further along the
road to moral knowledge. Suppose our moral judger is not making any
mistake about the facts (facts that anyone would concede are facts) and
is thinking of the subject matter in a frame of mind that allows his feelings to respond to what is judged apart from its bearing on self-interest.
Then, given the broad Humean assumption one paragraph back that we
are accepting for the sake of argument, there exist facts that account
268
for the feeling of pleasure or displeasure, and this feeling is the moral
judgment. Although this implication does not obviously reduce to saying that the judger is having feelings about moral facts, it isnt clear why
we should resist this conclusion if we take Hume seriously. The feelings
are moral feelings on his view; moreover, they are feelings that would
arise in exactly the same way for virtually anyone who is not mistaken
about what these facts are and views them apart from their bearing on
self-interest. Why not say, then, that the feelings are about moral facts?
The answer that the non-cognitivist will urge is that the facts are not
really moral facts but quite ordinary facts. We have a situation in which
someone has (by Humes theory) moral feelings about non-moral facts.
This response is, of course, classical non-cognitivism, but we dont have
to read this situation that way. To insist that we do would be questionbegging. One alternative is familiar from the literature. It is to treat
Hume as an ideal observer theorist who holds that a moral fact about
virtue (say) is a fact about what someone would feel who is in an ideal
position to observe the subject matter (has an accurate view of the garden variety facts, is thinking about them impartially, is normal, and so
on). Thus, Henry Aiken writes: Hume holds that any morally good act
is one which, in the last analysis, would be approved by an impartial
spectator as useful or agreeable to ourselves or others (Aiken (1948),
xxxviii). This alternative has familiar problems, for example, that the
judgment is not directly about the object judged but about someones
reactions to it, even though the moral judgment appears to be directly
about the object judged. A better alternative is to say just that the commonplace fact cited earlier about the usefulness of a certain character is
a moral fact; and it is a moral fact because it explains what is for Hume
almost a universal feeling of pleasure when this fact about usefulness is
considered impartially. One could say without too much exaggeration
that the moral feelings experienced represent the moral fact to which
they are a natural response, at least if one accepts Humes understanding of moral judgment and human nature.
We are now in a position to take the third step. When we feel the
pleasure in this way we also normally believe (rightly or wrongly) that
the feeling experienced is justified or warranted by the subject matter.
269
We can be mistaken, because we have misunderstood the facts (in a

perfectly ordinary sense) or are thinking about what we judge in a biased
way. Suppose, however, that we are not mistaken in these ways. Then
the belief we have when we experience these feelings is factually true.
That is, the belief that we are not in error in these ways is true. Our
judgment thus has two elements, one of belief and another of feeling.
We can recognize additional ingredients on the side of motivation, such
as the desire to encourage what we find pleasurable. Why not also allow
on the belief side the further belief that the useful character that we
morally admire is a moral character, that is, is truly virtuous as a matter
of moral fact?
Hume does not go quite this far, at least not explicitly, but the implication is consistent with the rest of his theory. Morals are still based on
sentiment, not on reason in the manner of theorists who would nowadays be called non-naturalist. Reason alone tells us nothing, but reason
is not completely absent either. Moral judgment springs from reason
and sentiment; it begins with and is ultimately based on sentiment. It
is, after all, through justified feeling that we know what is virtuous and
what is vicious. Why isnt the knowledge embodied in our justified
feelings moral knowledge?
If this interpretation of Hume counts as moral realism, it is a naturalistic form of moral realism, far from the examples of moral realism
that place emphasis on moral belief in contrast to moral feeling and
that locate moral facts in a non-natural realm. It is, nevertheless, moral
realism in precisely the sense that it entails moral knowledge of moral
facts. Though I have not given a full-dress defence of this interpretation of Hume, the foregoing suggests how we can see Hume as a moral
realist through the lens of a new conception of moral judgment. Hume
appears through this lens neither cognitivist nor non-cognitivista surprising conclusion if these terms are contradictories. I have argued,
though, that they are at best only contraries. Thinking otherwise has
confused us not only regarding the relation between moral belief and
moral desire but also about the possibility of moral knowledge based
on moral emotion. The age-old dichotomy between reason and emotion
dies hard, but we need to move beyond it if we are to understand the
270
complex nature of moral judgment and moral knowledge.
Chapter 11
Moral Claims and Epistemic

Contexts
M ICHAEL H YMERS
Abstract
In What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer to the Open-Question
Argument Leave to Moral Judgments? David Braybrooke claims that the
justification of a moral claim is independent of the justification of morality generallythat ethical justification does not have to be traced back to
meta-ethical justification. I support this claim by appealing to a contextualist theory of epistemic justification. Drawing on the work of Michael
Williams and Robert Brandom, I contend, first, that every claim is justified by default and requires articulated reasons only when it is challenged.
Not every challenge is a reasonable challengeonly those that share the
burden of proof are. Second, I hold that sceptics about moral truth and
justification, such as J.L. Mackie, are committed to a substantive philosophical position, closely linked to foundationalism, that Williams has
called epistemological realism, insofar as they hold that moral claims
are intrinsically less certain than claims about non-moral facts on which
moral facts might be taken to supervene. But there is no reason to believe that any propositions are intrinsically more certain than any others.
Certainty is a function of epistemic context, not semantic or empirical
content. Therefore, although moral claims may presuppose the truth of
some meta-ethical claims, the justification of moral claims does not depend on the justification of meta-ethical claims.
In
writing this essay, I have benefited greatly from conversations with and presentations by
271
272
CHAPTER 11. MICHAEL HYMERS
In What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer to the Open-Question Argument Leave to Moral Judgments? (Braybrooke, 2003c), David
Braybrooke arrives at a conclusion that may provoke some disquiet
among those with strongly objectivist intuitions about moral judgments:
We have, in this conception of moral realism, as explained
meta-ethically, true used within one structure of ideas that
figures among many logically possible structures, in this case,
a structure of ideas ultimately invoking thriving, personal
and social, and empirical evidence about thriving. It is a
loose enough sense of thriving to accommodate some minor variations in conceptions of thriving. At the same time,
true is used unselfconsciously, without thinking of metaethics, within moral discourse itself with no apprehension,
and no compelling reason to apprehend, that the basis for using it is liable to being supplanted. Just so we can habitually
rely on one calendar, knowing that it is just one among many
possible calendars, many of which have bizarre features, and
none of which may be accurate astronomically. (350)
The objectivists whom I have in mind will regard Braybrookes use
of the distinction between ethics and meta-ethics as artificial and illegitimate, contending that applications of the truth-predicate to moral
claims are justifiable only if meta-ethical claims about basic moral principles and objective grounds of value are also justifiable. Such objectivist impulses will drive these philosophers either to become Platonists about value or to become subjectivists about value (because they
conclude that the conditions necessary for true moral judgments are
absent).
I shall argue here that the objectivist impulse that leads to these
results arises, at least in part, from a commitment to what Michael
Williams has called epistemological realism (Williams (1996), 89134; Williams (2001), 84, 193), the doctrine that there are natural relations of epistemic priority among our beliefs and claims. Rejecting this
Mason Cash, Richmond Campbell, and Jenna Woodrow. Thanks also to Tom Vinci, Nathan
Brett, and David Braybrooke for their comments on an earlier draft of this essay.
11.1. MOORES OPEN QUESTION
273
doctrine in favour of a variety of epistemic contextualism, I shall argue

that Braybrookes use of the ethics/meta-ethics distinction is reasonable,
comparing his moral realism to a kind of conventionalism about mathematical truth that sees realism as lying in our deep need (Wittgenstein
(1978), 65) for conventions.
11.1 Moores Open Question, Expressivism, and Truth in

Ethics
Braybrooke begins his discussion with the observation that expressivist
treatments of moral language can be regarded as a response to G.E.
Moores open question argument. Moore contends that any attempt
to define good is destined for failure because, for any candidate definition, it will always make sense to say of a given action or outcome that
it conforms to the definition but is not good. Suppose we define good
as utility, for example. A critic of utilitarianism can always intelligibly
contend that a given outcome has a higher utility than its rivals without
being good.
However, if the expression of emotions and imperatives is the
main thing about moral judgments, perhaps the only thing (Braybrooke
(2003c), 343), then there is clearly no danger of dogmatically closing
off debate by insisting that good is pleasure or conduciveness to a thriving society or the display of respect for humanity, whether in ones own
person or that of another. Insofar as moral judgments are merely expressions of emotion or imperatives to act or respond emotionally in a
particular way, there is a sense in which the question of what is good
is left wide open, for no definition of good is given by such a theory.
The emotive and imperative aspects of your [moral] judgment . . . will
always fight free of being tied down, as Braybrooke puts it, to one of
the exemplary uses or definitions that you offer (342).
The emotive and imperative character of moral judgments is not by
itself cause for any alarm, Braybrooke observes, because any reasonable
story about moral language must account for the motivational force of
moral judgments, and expressivism does just this. M oral judgments
have to be moving, at least in suitable contexts and for a suitable au-
274
dience, and both emotions and imperatives are essential to their being
so (343). This much, indeed, remains compatible with giving an account of which moral judgments are justifiable or right, for although
the expressivist holds that moral judgments are not truth-apt, she may
yet agree without contradiction that the attitudes expressed or imperatives issued can be measured against some standard of evaluation. For
example, some attitudes and imperatives may be held justified because
they promote the thriving of a society (343) and others unjustifiable
because they detract from that thriving.
So, at a glance, it seems that there is no role for the concept of truth
in moral theory. Ethics can . . . work, both at the level of immediate
moral judgments and at the deeper level on which these judgments are
justified, without invoking the concept of truth (344). However, matters
are more complicated than this in Braybrookes view. He argues that
attempts to dismiss the concept of truth from ethics (344) lead their
proponents into two kinds of awkwardness.
First, there is the awkwardness involved in the fact that truth is the
concept to which we appeal when we are engaged in any sort of serious endorsement (344), whether such endorsement should arise in
the context of particle physics, of history, of small talk about middlesized dry goods, or of big talk about ethics. It is, says Braybrooke, a
feature of ordinary moral discourse (345) that we judge to be true
those moral claims to which we commit ourselves. And so, deviations from such ordinary practice demand some extraordinary reason.
Such an extraordinary reason is not provided by expressivist accounts
of moral discourse, such as emotivism and prescriptivism. These positive views concerning moral language arose in response to prior critiques of the truth-evaluability of moral claims and do not themselves
provide any such critique. Indeed, Braybrooke argues, a moral realist
someone who holds minimally that moral claims are truth-evaluable and
that some of them are truecan happily endorse much of what the expressivist wants to say about the pragmatic force of indicative sentences
containing morally evaluative terms without supposing that the meaning of such terms as good has thereby been settled. What is needed is
simply a plausible story about how to distinguish the distinctive crite-
11.1. MOORES OPEN QUESTION
275
ria for endorsing moral judgments from the grounds for endorsing or
making scientific propositions or common sense reports of perception
(345). If truth is a term of serious endorsement, then we are entitled
to apply it to moral judgments so long as we try to work out a general
theory of warranting judgments, in which warranting moral judgments
would proceed in some respects differently from warranting reports of
perception, and warranting aesthetic judgments more differently still
(345). We might, for example, say that just those moral judgments are
warranted that are certified by justified moral rules, most plausibly,
rules that promote the thriving of societies and the people who belong
to them (345).
Second, says Braybrooke, when we assert that particular moral rules
are justified, we seem clearly to be committing ourselves to the truth of
such statements. He summarizes the point:
A rule cited to warrant a moral judgment praising an honest
action is endorsed as according with the appropriate grounds
or criteria for adopting such a rule, the grounds or criteria
for justifying it. Here the place of truth is secure, whether or
not what is justified by the justification are themselves truthbearers, as in some case, they clearly are not, as long as what
are to be taken as appropriate grounds or criteria have been
identified, even if only by fiat, and accepted. (345)
So, even if we were to retreat and allow the expressivist point that moral
evaluations are not genuine assertions, but expressions of (dis)approval
or exhortations to act or refrain, and so not truth-value candidates,1 it
would not follow that such expressions cannot be candidates for justification, nor that there is no truth of the matter concerning whether or not
they are justified.
Now it may seem that in trying to hang on to truth in ethics Braybrooke runs afoul of the very open-question argument that he wanted to
1 As Rockney Jacobsen in Jacobsen (1997) has argued, this inference is suspect. The meaning
of a sentence is unaltered by the pragmatic force with which it used on a given occasion, but if
meaning and truth-conditions are inter-related, then it is not clear that a change in pragmatic force
from assertion to exhortation should have any effect on whether or what truth-value a sentence
expresses.
276
treat expressivism as a response to, because his appeal to the certification of moral judgments by rules that promote the thriving of societies
and the people who belong to them (345) looks suspiciously like a definition of good. Does such a definition not dogmatically forestall debate on goodness in just the way Moore argued was unreasonable? No,
says Braybrooke, because Moore failed to distinguish between ethics
and meta-ethics (347)between the making of moral judgments and
the discussion or consideration of them without endorsing themand
one can quite coherently express ones commitment to a particular definition of good in ones ethical judgments, while still acknowledging
at the meta-ethical level that such a definition is just one among many
possible definitions (347-50).
There may, for example, be variation among people concerning what
thriving amounts to (348), even though most agree that conduciveness
to thriving is a key criterion for the justification of moral claims. Or,
indeed, there may be disagreement about whether the notion of thriving has any role to play in defining good. But neither of these facts,
thinks Braybrooke, need impair our commitment to the specific criteria on which we wish to take a stand (349). The long course of human
experience, he seems to want to say, makes certain criteria of thriving uniquely compelling (349) grounds for the justification of moral
judgments. And so, Braybrooke concludes, we can endorse the truth
of moral claims, even while allowing that the principles that may be invoked to justify them are contingent principles that we might never have
adoptedthat there are, indeed, other principles that reasonable people
might well prefer.
But it is at this point that the objectivists I alluded to in my opening remarks will want to interject with the following dilemma: either
the uniquely compelling nature of Braybrookes principles of thriving
consists in our believing them to be the correct definition of good, or
we cannot possibly be moral realists, for the kind of warrant required
if moral judgments are to count as true must derive from the truth of
Braybrookes principles of thriving. In short, the distinction between
ethics and meta-ethics that Braybrooke relies on is illegitimate because
it masks the fact that one can get moral truth only by denying that the
11.2. DEFLATIONISM
277
question of how to define good is really open.
11.2 Deflationism
As I remarked earlier, I plan to defend Braybrookes reliance on the
ethics/meta-ethics distinction by appealing to a contextualist account of
epistemic justification and to an analogy with Wittgensteins conventionalist treatment of mathematics. I want to begin, however, with some
remarks about the notion of truth most suitable to Braybrookes moral
realism.
Proponents of various deflationary accounts of truth may well give
Braybrooke a commendatory pat on the back for his proposal that we
preserve the place of truth in ethics by work[ing] out a general theory
of warranting judgments, in which warranting moral judgments would
proceed in some respects differently from warranting reports of perception, and warranting aesthetic judgments more differently still (345).
This is because a recurrentthough perhaps not universalfeature of
such accounts is their acknowledgment that the application of the truthpredicate is (a) something that can be appropriately done to any wellformed declarative sentence of natural language that can play a role
in inferences and be a patient undergoing the standard logical operations, and (b) a distinctive speech act whose pragmatic force consists
in the serious endorsement, to use Braybrookes words, of the claim
at hand.2 However, Braybrooke sees in such intellectual chumminess
a disguised criticismnamely, that truth has no interesting role to play
in ethics because the application of the truth-predicate to moral claims
amounts to no more than the reiteration of those self-same claims (348).
At least one relevant contrast here involves some sort of correspondence theory of truth. For a correspondence theorist, to call a moral
claim true is to commit oneself to there being some objective fact in
2 I want to avoid an issue that divides deflationistsnamely, whether a sentence or what a
sentence expresses counts as the appropriate vehicle of truth. My own sympathies lie in the latter
camp, but I do not thereby wish to be committed to an ontology of abstract, sentence-like entities
called propositions. Trying to clarify how that is possible would take me too far afield to be
worthwhile here. (See Glock (2003), chap. 4, especially at 134). My fellow deflationists should
be able to recast what I say here in terms of Brandoms version of the prosentential theory of truth.
See Brandom (1994), chap. 5).
278
the world that makes the moral claim true and which does so in a way
that explains or grounds the truth of the moral judgment. Truth has
a substantive nature, and moral truth does, too. Starting from these assumptions, the deflationist may seem to be saying that insofar as nothing
in general explains truth, nothing in general explains the truth of moral
judgments, and so attaching the truth-predicate to such judgments is
unconstrained by any moral reality. Indeed, the judgments themselves
are similarly unconstrained. They are, perhaps, mere expressions of
feeling or personal preference or prescriptions by which we hope to influence the behaviour of others, and the fact that we can apply the truthpredicate to them does nothing to make them more cognitively robust.
It seems to me that this interpretation of deflationary treatments of
truth reduces them all to some form of redundancy theory of truth
(347), according to which (b) above exhausts both the pragmatic and
semantic roles of truth. However, there is no reason to suppose that
deflationism is committed to such a theory, which is doubly implausible.
First, it ignores the fact that true sometimes has other pragmatic roles
to play than endorsement, as when I caution someone that what she
believes might well be true, but I see no justification for it,3 or as when
I judge that if a valid arguments premises are true, then so must its
conclusion be, without thereby endorsing any of the premises or the
conclusion. Second, it collapses an account of the pragmatic use of
true into an account of the semantic role of truea mistake entirely
analogous to the one Braybrooke accuses expressivist accounts of moral
discourse of having committed (i.e., supposing that an account of the
pragmatic force of moral claims tells us about the semantic role of
morally evaluative terms). Even someone who thinks that pragmatics is
logically prior to semantics should be wary of that mistake.4 A wiser
deflationism insists on keeping these two dimensions of truth distinct.
Still, it may seem that deflationism has little to say about the application of true and false to moral judgments beyond the observation
that moral judgments are expressed by well-formed sentences that can
3
See Rorty (Rorty (1991), 128) for this cautionary use of true.
Robert Brandom (Brandom (1994), chap. 5), who holds just such a priority-of-pragmatics
thesis argues that the mistake of the classical pragmatists was precisely to confuse the pragmatics
of truth with the semantics of truth.
4
11.3. CONTEXTUALISM: DEFAULT AND CHALLENGE
279
be embedded in conditionals, and subject to negation, conjunction, and

disjunction. It may seem that way because it is that way. Deflationists
do not think that truth has a nature, and a fortiori they do not think that
moral truth has a nature. They do not think that truth is an explanatory
concept that gives us some non-trivial insight into why some of our scientific theories work so well, and a fortiori they do not think that the
truth of moral judgments can be enlisted to explain why we hold some
of the moral views that we do. But this need not prevent them from
agreeing with the spirit of Braybrookes proposal, already encountered,
that we can keep the concept of truth in place and work out a general
theory of warranting judgments (345).
A general theory of warranting judgments seems to me to be too
ambitious a goal because I do not think that there is anything both general and non-trivial to be said about the nature of epistemic warrant.
But, in a way, it is precisely such a lack of ambition that best serves
Braybrookes desire to see warrantor justification, as I shall henceforth preferas variable according to the context in which a judgment
is made.
11.3 Contextualism: Default and Challenge

By the term contextualism I mean to designate a view about epistemic justification that is hinted at in Wittgensteins On Certainty and
developed more explicitly by such philosophers as David Annis, Robert
Brandom, and Michael Williams.5 I think that Williamss view is the
best thought out of any of these (though it overlaps considerably with
Brandoms), and it dovetails significantly with my own more inchoate
views,6 so I shall focus on it here.
5 Jane Duran (Duran (1995)) and some other feminist epistemologists have made some convergent suggestions about the relation between justification and context. Williams is, unfortunately, rather dismissive of feminist epistemologyor, rather, I hypothesize that he would be if
he bothered to mention it by name in his Problems of Knowledge. There the closest he comes
to it is to refer critically to standpoint epistemology (Williams (2001), 220), which he confuses
with versions of relativism. The term contextualism has also been applied to somewhat different
accounts of justification advanced by David Lewis, Stewart Cohen, and Keith DeRose. I shall
not be concerned with such views here.
6 See (Hymers (2000), chaps 1, 3, and 4).
280
Williams defines contextualism as the view that standards for correctly attributing or claiming knowledge are not fixed but subject to circumstantial variation (Williams (2001), 159). This view is best understood in the context of considering how to respond to two kinds
of scepticism, which I follow Williams in labelling Agrippan and
Cartesian. Agrippan scepticism is so named because of its relation
to Agrippas trilemma (Williams (2001), 62; Williams (1996), 60),
also known as the Munchhausen trilemma. For any knowledge claim
that is advanced, the Agrippan sceptic demands some justification in
support of that claim, but the presentation of evidence or argument in
favour of the original claim results only in a further challenge from the
Agrippan, who incessantly demands of us how we know that which we
cite as justificationand so the conversation continues. The Agrippans
challenge seems to leave us with only three options: embark on an infinite regress of reasons for reasons (and so never complete the task of
justifying the initial claim), argue in a circle (and so, fail to give a genuine reason), or dogmatically assert the truth of some claim (and so, fail
even to try to give a reason). Because none of these seems to constitute actually justifying our original knowledge claim, we are placed in
the uncomfortable position of having to concede that we are ignorant
where we thought we knew. Because such a sceptical argument can be
launched against any knowledge claim, the scope of our ignorance is
immense.
Both foundationalism and coherentism are often presented as attempts to answer the Agrippan sceptic. The foundationalist contends
that our beliefs can be classified into two kinds: (i) basic beliefs, which
do not rely on any other beliefs for their justification and which are intrinsically credible (Williams (2001), 82)justified by their very nature; (ii) non-basic beliefs, which acquire what justification they can get
from being inferentially connected to one of more basic beliefs. Such
basic beliefs serve as stopping points for the sceptics infinite regress
without being dogmatic (or so it is contended).
The coherentist, by contrast, contends that the foundationalist adheres to an incorrect linear model of justificationa model shared with
the Agrippan sceptic. This linear model is mistaken because it is linked
11.3. CONTEXTUALISM: DEFAULT AND CHALLENGE
281
to a dubious semantic atomism (102) without which the idea of a basic belief cannot be made intelligible. In order for the foundationalists
basic beliefs to wear their justification on their sleeves, they must be intelligible in radical detachment from any other beliefs. If their content
is determined, even in part, by their inferential connections with other
beliefs, then it seems that their justification must also be, and so they
fail to be basic beliefs.7
Doubts about this sort of semantic atomism make the coherentist dubious that there are any such things as the basic beliefs described by the
foundationalist, to which the epistemic credentials of all other beliefs
can allegedly be traced. On the contrary, justification must proceed
holistically, according to this view. A belief counts as justified only
insofar as it belongs to a justified system of beliefs, and a system of beliefs counts as justified, in turn, only insofar as it is a coherent system.
But coherence is not mere consistency. A coherent system of beliefs is
rich in inferential connections (both deductive and non-deductive), and
it is more coherent to the degree that it is both comprehensive and explanatory. All local attempts at justification, the coherentist holds, are
ultimately beholden to a broader global coherence of this sort.
Williamss contextualist thinks that foundationalism and coherentism are both committed to two controversial assumptions that lie at
the respective hearts of our two kinds of scepticismAgrippan and
Cartesian. The first of these Williams calls the Prior Grounding Requirement (24). (The second, to which I shall return below, Williams
calls Epistemological Realism.) The Prior Grounding Requirement,
in brief, says that one is not being a responsible epistemic agent unless
ones beliefs are based on adequate evidence (24). This entails, on the
one hand, a thoroughgoing internalism, according to which the only
justifiers are those within the ken of the would-be knower, and, on the
7 Thus Descartes is led to the view that he has an immediate and utterly simple intuition of
his own existence as a thinking thing, and empiricist foundationalists like Schlick find themselves
clinging to ostensibly atomistic judgments or expressions of immediate sense experience such as
Red here now. In order for such Konstatierungen to serve as justifiers for any other beliefs, they
must be propositional in form. But it seems that as soon as they are propositional, they involve
concepts whose meaning or content is determined in part by their applicability on other occasions.
This makes them vulnerable to error, and such vulnerability to error threatens their status as foundations (recent attempts to articulate a modest or moderate foundationalism notwithstanding).
282
other hand, a commitment to the view that ones belief is justified only if
no further evidence would serve as defeating evidence. A consequence
of setting the standards of justification so high is that it is easy for a
critic to challenge ones justification. All she need do is ask, How do
you know that? and the Agrippan trilemma is immediately brought into
play. The burden of proof lies entirely and squarely on the shoulders of
the knowledge claimant so that every epistemic claim is, as Williams
puts it, guilty unless proved innocent (149).
This legal analogy suggests an alternative. If we adopt the view that
beliefs are to be considered innocent until proven guilty, then we get
something like what Robert Brandom calls a default and challenge
(Brandom (1994), 177; Williams (2001), 36) model of justification. According to this view, every belief has the normative status (Brandom
(1994), 16-17) of being justified by default, and it loses this status only
if it is brought into question by a reasonable challengea challenge
that either gives positive reasons for thinking that the claim is false or,
at a later dialectical stage, gives positive reasons for doubting whatever
justification may be marshalled in defence of a claim that has been confronted by a reasonable challenge. This model, Williams submits, does
better justice to our actual practices of giving and demanding reasons,
according to which the burden of proof is something to be shared by the
parties involved in a critical exchange. It denies the sceptic the undefended right to enter naked challenges (Williams (2001), 150).
It might be wondered what, in principle, prevents the Default and
Challenge model from leading disputing parties into an infinite regress
of reasons. The answer is, Nothingin principle. If people had unlimited lifespans, few practical concerns, and vast intellectual resources,
they might continue to debate forever. (Indeed, some debates seem
interminablewe politely call them philosophy.) But in practice many
debates do come to an endan end at which no further reasonable challenge is forthcoming, or an end at which the knowledge claimant fails
to respond to a reasonable challenge. Such ends are not the intrinsically
credible basic beliefs of the foundationalist, but they are not cases of
acquiescing in dogma either. They are reasonable resting points, sometimes temporary, sometimes very stable, and they vary from one context
11.4. CONTEXTUALISM
283
of debate to another.8 There is no reason, prima facie, to expect all reasonably resolved debates to end up in the same place. It makes no more
sense to ask which points are intrinsically stopping points than it does
to ask which points in Ohio are starting points? (Quine (1980), 35).
Such resting points help to define a context of debate or inquiry.
Unlike the classical foundationalists basic beliefs, they are not intrinsically beyond doubt, but to entertain doubts about them is to mistake
or change the context of inquiry. Thus, to respond without joking to
my claim that I left my wallet in my office with the challenge How do
you know? You might just be dreaming is to enter a challenge that is
inappropriate in the context, although it may well have a place in some
other context of debatea class on epistemology, for example.
But the latter-day foundationalist will demur, insisting that insofar
as all knowledge of the world around us comes from the senses, we can
expect that all debates one way or another can be properly resolved only
by tracing reasons back to basic beliefs about sense experience. And the
coherentist will insist that the temporary or stable resting points at which
many debates actually stop do not count as anything more than justification for practical purposes. Such local justification becomes justification proper, only when it has been pursued to the global level (Williams
(1996), 290).
11.4 Contextualism: Rejecting Epistemological Realism

Both of these objections lead usif not obviouslyto our second kind
of sceptical worry. If Agrippan scepticism gets its force from the Prior
Grounding Requirementfrom the permission of naked challenges to
knowledge claimsthe same cannot be said of Cartesian scepticism.
For Cartesian sceptical problems are problems of underdetermination.
To put this in my own favoured vocabulary, the sceptic about the external world assumes that the relation between experience and the world
is paradigmatically an external relationthat it is such that we could
identify and describe our experience without thereby being assured that
8 There are also unfinished debates that reach no resolution, because of, for example, either
intractable disagreement or the death of one or more parties.
284
we could identify and describe the reality that we assume to lie beyond
appearances. This is because the Cartesian sceptic offers a rival hypothesis for the explanation of experience. Unlike the Agrippan sceptic, she
does not simply ask, How do you know that? Rather, she suggests
that the hypothesis that there is a world beyond my mind, populated by
objects, events, and other minds, lacks explanatory power because the
evidence in its favour is also evidence in favour of the hypothesis that
I am the victim of some evil demons deceptive activities. Cartesian
scepticism is thus committed to what Williams refers to as epistemological realism (Williams (2001), 84, 193; Williams (1996), 89-134).
This is the view that beliefs get their epistemic status from their content,
so that some beliefs are by their very nature epistemically prior to others. It is the alleged intrinsic epistemic priority (as opposed to causal
priority) of beliefs about immediate experience that makes the Cartesian
underdetermination problem pressing. If epistemic priority is a matter
of context and not content, then the Cartesian problem can be avoided
in many contexts.
Williams thinks that both foundationalism and coherentism are also
committed to epistemological realism. This commitment is most obvious in the case of the foundationalist, for whom basic beliefstypically
beliefs about the immediate contents of experiencehave an intrinsic
epistemic priority over non-basic beliefs. But Williams argues that it
also characterizes the case of the coherentist, who is committed by
a more circuitous route to granting epistemic priority to principles
of logic (needed for making assessments about coherence) (Williams
(2001), 135; Williams (1996), 301) and to meta-beliefs (Williams
(1996), 302) concerning the coherence of ones own total system of
beliefs (Williams (2001), 136-7). (Either the meta-belief that my system of beliefs is coherent is justified, or it is not. If it is, then that must
be because it belongs to a more encompassing system of beliefs, about
whose coherence I now require a further meta-belief whose justification
is in question. If it is not, then I have no reason to think that my belief
system is really coherent after all and no justification, ultimately, for
any of my beliefs.) Coherentism is foundationalism in disguise (137).
Contextualism, then, is characterized in part by a rejection of episte-
11.4. CONTEXTUALISM
285
mological realism (and with it, foundationalism, coherentism, and vulnerability to Cartesian underdetermination problems) and of the Prior
Grounding Requirement, in favour of a Default and Challenge Model
of epistemic justification. Can more be said in the way of a positive
characterization of the view? Briefly, Williams outlines five kinds of
constraints on epistemic contexts that determine whether a given belief
or claim should be taken to be justified.
First, if we are to be engaged in meaningful inquiry or debate at all,
we must assume as justified a significant bundle of background beliefs.
A doubt that doubted everything would not be a doubt ( Wittgenstein
(1972), 450). This is just a corollary of the default and challenge
model, which holds a belief justified unless challenged and requires
that challenges be reasonable. Williams (Williams, 1996) refers to constraints of this kind as intelligibility or semantic constraints (159). Related to, but less general than, such semantic constraints are methodological (160) or topical or disciplinary constraints (117). Such
constraints treat certain propositions as methodological necessities
(Williams (2001), 160; Williams (1996), 123), exempting them from
doubt in a way that serves to define a context of inquiry. Thus, it is a
methodological necessity of particle physics that there are subatomic
particles. If one doubts this, then one has ceased to do particle physics
and has moved to a new epistemic contextthe context of some radically new physical theory, perhaps, or, more likely, the context of instrumentalist philosophy of science. Similarly, it is a precondition of historical inquiryWilliamss favourite examplethat historians assume
that the Earth existed long before we were all born. Such methodological necessities, as we saw earlier, are not themselves indubitable. But
to attempt to cast doubt on them is either to misunderstand the context
of inquiry or to try deliberately to change it.
Once one has embarked on a particular inquiry, ones claims and
questions become subject to a third kind of constraintdialectical
constraints (Williams (2001), 161; Williams (1996), 117). Whether my
claim that Arthur Wellesleys failed night attack at Seringapatam made
him leery of such attacks in the future is justified or not depends on
what has already been said by military historians on the subject. If
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evidence has already been presented that offers some rival explanation
for Wellesleys preferences, then my claim will not enjoy the status of
being default-justified. But if I am the first one to broach the matter,
then default justification is mine.
Of course, how stringent we are about demanding justification depends on how much time we have, and what the stakes are in a given
debate. The more severe the practical consequences of being wrong
are, the tighter the economic constraints (Williams (2001), 161) will
be. When my life hangs in the balance, I apply a higher standard of justification to the claim that the cup on the left, not the cup on the right,
contains the poison than I would if I were doing a high school chemistry
experiment.
Finally, if my claims about Arthur Wellesley at the battle of Seringapatam are to be justified, it must not only be the case that there is no
contrary claim already in play and that sceptical (or, in the case of
pre-history, evangelical) doubts about the age of the Earth are held in
abeyance; it must, additionally, actually be true that the Earth existed
long before we were born. If the Earth is not more than two hundred years old, then no claim about Arthur Wellesleys early exploits
is justified at all. Such situational constraints (Williams (2001), 162;
Williams (1996), 117) make it clear that contextualism is not a purely
internalist picture of justification because my beliefs being justified depends in part upon the instantiation of facts that may be well beyond my
ken. Similarly, it must be the case that my eyes are functioning sufficiently well if my claim that the driver who almost ran me over was at
the wheel of a sports-utility vehicle and not a sedan is to be justified
even though the proper functioning of my eyes may be in certain respects beyond my own ability to discover. Contextualism thus acknowledges that reliabilism points to something important in our practices
of justification, but declines any attempt to reduce normative concepts
like justification to ostensibly non-normative ones, like causation by a
reliable process.9
9 As Williams points out, reliability is a covertly normative term (Williams (2001), 33), since
a process is reliable to the extent that it produces results that we value. I take this to be much the
same point that John Pollock makes (Pollock (1986), 118-201), when he complains about the
11.5. ETHICAL CONTEXTS AND META-ETHICAL CONTEXTS
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The contextualist thinks that both epistemological realism and the

Prior Grounding Requirement are contentious theoretical commitments.
One may be epistemically responsible without having adequate evidence for ones belief, and beliefs get their epistemic priority or posteriority not from their content, but from their context. If this is so, then
sceptical worries about our knowledge of the external world can get
no purchase, as long as we are not committed to the epistemological realism or the Prior Grounding Requirement that they rely on. Scepticism
is not, of course, refuted by such considerations, but its reliance on contentious theoretical premises entails (i) that the sceptic is herself committed to knowledge claims to which we need not be committedan
embarrassing position for a thoughtful sceptic to be inand (ii) that we
need not be troubled by the sceptics peculiar worries precisely because
they are peculiarthey are of concern only for someone who must accept commitment to the theoretical presuppositions on which sceptical
doubts rely.10
11.5 Ethical Contexts and Meta-ethical Contexts

It should be clear that this sort of contextualism is friendly to Braybrookes suggestion that we view justification in such a way that warranting moral judgments would proceed in some respects differently
from warranting reports of perception, and warranting aesthetic judgments more differently still (Braybrooke (2003c), 345). Contexts of
moral judgment differ from contexts of perceptual judgment and from
contexts of aesthetic judgment. It is, for example, a methodological
necessity of moral judgments that there are agents and patients who
can be harmed or benefited by ones actions and the actions of others.
Without this assumption, morality would have no foothold. In another
arbitrariness that faces any attempt to identify the process that produces a belief and then evaluate
that process for its reliability.
10 As Williams points out, contextualism also has the unexpected but harmless result that
when we take the sceptics worries seriously by at least provisionally entertaining epistemological
realismas in the context of discussing them in a class on epistemologywe actually cease to
know things about the world around us. But as soon as we emerge from our discussion into the
world of practical affairs, the knowledge we had lost comes back again. Williams calls this the
instability of knowledge (Williams (1996), chap. 8; Williams (2001), chap. 4).
288
contextthe context of perceptual judgments, for exampleit is not

clear that the potential harms or benefits of my actions for others have
the same constitutive status. Indeed, that same judgment may be called
into doubt in some other context (e.g., the problem of other minds).
The affinity between this sort of contextualism and Braybrookes position is made more manifest if we reconsider his remark that Moores
open-question argument neglects the distinction between ethics and metaethics. The argument has an important place, he thinks, but its importance is meta-ethical rather than ethical:
In meta-ethics, the possibility of alternative definitions of
good and other moral terms is firmly established. Asking
the open question of what is seized upon to define good
as in Is this really good? amounts to asking Could good
not be defined otherwise?, which is the counterpart in metaethics of Is this really good?, and displaces it. The answer to Could good be defined otherwise? is always
Yes.(347)
But, thinks Braybrooke, from the possibility of alternative definitions of
good we ought not to infer that no definition of good is ever of any
value to us, or, indeed, that every definition is as valuable to us as every
other.
I think that the situation here parallels a certain form of conventionalism about mathematics that we find in the work of Wittgenstein.
According to this kind of conventionalism, certain principles of mathematics are implicit in our practices before we ever articulate them,
perhaps for reasons having to do with the natural history of human
beings (Wittgenstein (1968), 415), in particular, our evolutionary history. That we have the mathematics (or, perhaps, even the logic) that we
do is a contingent matter of fact. Thus that certain propositions count
as necessary propositionspropositions that seem to tell us about the
essence of thingsis, ultimately, the result of an implicit convention,
but this does not make it arbitrary. [T]o the depth that we see in the
essence there corresponds the deep need for the convention (Wittgenstein (1978), 65). And given the convention, we have ways of sorting
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the justified mathematical claims from the unjustified ones.

Likewise, having accepted a certain contingent definition of good
perhaps because it is implicit in our behaviourwe may find ourselves
under the illusion that it is the only possible one and, so, react with
dissatisfaction to any attempt to make that definition explicit, once we
realize that such explicit formulation opens the door to alternative possibilities. ( Schlick and Waismann, under the spell of the Tractatus,
reacted similarly to the idea of alternative logics.) But, again, given a
particular definition of good, we have ways of sorting the justified moral
claims from the unjustified ones.
A comparison with mathematical conventionalism is not likely to
still the unease that a critic may feel upon encountering Braybrookes
contention that the justification of ethical judgments is a matter entirely distinct from the justification of meta-ethical judgments.11 Here is
where I think contextualism can be of greatest use to Braybrooke. If we
are inclined to think that the justification of a moral claim presupposes
the justification of some meta-ethical principle, then that, I think, is because we are tacitly committed to what Williams calls epistemological
realism. An example may help to illustrate and justify my contention.
Imagine two academic philosophers engaged in debate about the old
Republic of South Africas policy of apartheid. One philosopher insists
that the policy is manifestly wrong and holds that it would be inappropriate, therefore, to extend an invitation to the South African vice-consul
to visit campus and speak on the topic Apartheid: The Other Side.12
The other philosopher responds by asking for some reason to believe in
the immorality of apartheid. Well, says the first, apartheid is a form of
treatment that discriminates on the basis of skin-colour. But why, asks
the second, is it wrong to discriminate on the basis of skin-colour?
Because skin-colour is a morally irrelevant difference, and it is always
wrong to discriminate on the basis of irrelevant differences. But what
11 Braybrooke (personal communication) objects that I do not get him quite right here, because
there may be cases in which meta-ethical judgments effectively undermine moral judgmentsfor
example, when someone asserts that Moral judgments are nothing but the expression of emotion
in response to my claim that It is wrong to boil your neighbours babies for dinner. I am inclined
to assimilate such cases to the debate about apartheid that I describe below.
12 Im not making this up.
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is the justification for such a rule? continues the second in his sifting
humour. At this point, the first philosopher may respond by citing some
general principlethe categorical imperative, perhaps, or the greatest
happiness principle, or, as Braybrooke would have it, a principle which
says that moral rules are licensed insofar as they contribute to a thriving society (Braybrooke (2003c), 342; my little dialogue, here, follows
the pattern of Braybrookes). But why, responds the second, should
we care about the thriving of a society or about the greatest happiness
of the greatest number or about treating others as ends in themselves?
Why think that any of these things tells us about moral goodness? Why,
indeed, think that there is any such thing as moral goodness? Isnt
goodness, after all, a rather queer property to expect to find being instantiated by anything in the world?A property that has the power to
motivate those who apprehend it?13
This debate over the rightness of a particular social practice quickly
turns into a debate about whether there are any such things as moral
properties or facts. It moves from the ethical level to the meta-ethical
level as if that were the most natural dialectical move in the world, and
up until the last step the second philosopher employs the very spare tool
kit of the Agrippan sceptic, asking why? whenever the first philosopher makes an assertion and insisting that the first philosopher bear the
burden of proving these assertions.
Non-philosophers surveying the debate will, I contend, think that the
second philosopher has missed the point or is merely playing games of
some sort,14 and if the context of the exchange is as part of a public
debate about whether or not to invite the South African vice-consul to
campus, then they will be right. Justification of a moral claim does not
depend on the justification of any general meta-ethical principle, and
in this context it is precisely the moral claim that is at issue, not the
meta-ethical principle. Why?
Let us apply the default and challenge model of justification to the
debate. According to that model, remember, the challenger cannot simply enter naked challenges. Challenges must, rather, be reasonable,
13
14
See Mackie (Mackie (1977), 38-42) for this argument from queerness.
As I said, Im not making this up.
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where a reasonable challenge is one that either shows fault with some
justification already given or provides some reason for thinking that
the conclusion being advanced is false. By this standard, the second
philosopher is obliged to show either that appeal to a rule or general
principle fails to support the claim that apartheid is wrong or that there
are positive reasons for thinking that apartheid is morally acceptable after all. In doing so, his position becomes vulnerable to criticism, too,
and the Agrippan road to moral scepticism about particular principles,
or about the objectivity of morality generally is blocked.
However, the second philosopher may well agree to these terms and
still try to make a sceptical case (i) about the particular moral claim
(apologists for apartheid used to try to meet this criterion by arguing,
for example, that the abolition of apartheid would lead to a civil war
that would produce far greater suffering than the policy of racial discrimination itself produced), or (ii) about the general principle (The
notion of thriving is too vague, might be the complaint) or (iii) about
the very existence of moral facts ( Mackies argument from queerness
shows us that no moral property is ever instantiated).15 The default
and challenge model of justification offers us no ground for complaint
here because the sceptic is in fact shouldering some of the burden of
proof. These challenges are clothed, not naked, and in this respect they
resemble the challenges of the Cartesian sceptic, who does not simply
ask How do you know? but tries to offer positive reasons for thinking that we do not have much of the knowledge that we naively assume
ourselves to have.
That much resemblance is too little for us to draw any interesting
conclusions about the plausibility of such moral scepticism. But there
are deeper resemblances, and they deserve our attention. In particular, the philosopher who tries to push the debate from stage (i) to stage
(ii) assumes that claims made at stage (i) lack proper justification unless a justification has been given of general moral principles. And the
15 Of course, there is another kind of moral scepticism, which has no obvious or plausible
counterpart in the case of global scepticism about the senses, corresponding to the question Why
should I be moral? Thats a philosophical chestnut that does not need roasting here, though
it is importantly connected with the internalism assumed by Mackies argument from queerness
(Mackie (1977), 38-42), to which I shall return.
292
philosopher who tries to push the debate further to stage (iii) assumes
that neither particular moral claims nor general moral principles have
proper justification, unless it has been shown that there really are such
things as moral facts. In both these moves, I detect epistemological
realism.
Consider the move from stage (i) to stage (ii). If I am to know some
particular moral claim to be true, then, the sceptic seems to be saying,
I must know some general moral principle that certifies that particular
claim (a necessary condition, not a sufficient one). The justification of
the particular claim is only provisional until we have presented the certifying general principle. This is to say that in virtue of their content,
particular moral claims are dependent for their justification on another
category of claims, also demarcated by their content general moral
principles. And this is to commit oneself to the idea that there are natural relations of epistemological priority (Williams (2001), 192). A reason to doubt epistemological realism is thus a reason to doubt that the
justification of particular moral claims is incomplete until those claims
have been traced to general moral principles.
This is not to deny that whatever general principles my particular
moral claims may presuppose must be true if I am to have knowledge
of those particular claims. As we saw earlier, justification is subject
to various situational constraints. But it is enoughsubject to our
other contextual constraints on justificationthat those principles be
true for my claims to be justified. I do not also have to have demonstrated them.16
The situation here is analogous to one that arises in the context of
our knowledge of cause and effect. Humeans about causation hold that
wherever there is some cause-and-effect relationship, there is also some
general causal law of which the particular case is an instance. But it
is not obvious that from this we should conclude that in order to have
knowledge of some particular instance of that relation I must have a
16 As Tom Vinci reminds me, a foundationalist can make sense of my not having to give a
justification for a general principle in order for a particular claim to be justified by invoking a distinction between there being a justification that could be given and that justifications having been
given. Such free-floating justifications that wait around to be given smell too much of Platonism
for my contextualist nose, but that is another debate.
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grasp of the causal law itself. It is enoughsubject to other contextual

constraintsthat there be such a law.17
Of course, if a reasonable challenge suggests that some general principle is false, then that does undermine my justification for particular
claimsjust as evidence for thinking that documentary reports of the
battle of Seringapatam had been falsified would undermine whatever
particular claims I tried to make about that battle.18 But I need not first
undertake to show that any general principle is correct in order to make
justified particular claims. That is, general principles are not by their
very nature (by their very content) better known than particular claims.
(Nor are particular claims by their very nature better known than general
principles.)
A comparable case can be made concerning some sceptical doubts
about the very reality of moral facts. The logical positivists, for example, doubted the reality of moral facts on grounds that no sense
experience would count for or against the truth of a moral claim like
Apartheid is wrong. The plausibility of such a proposal is, of course,
directly linked to the plausibility of holding a verification theory of
meaning, according to which the meaning of a statement is its method
of confirmation and disconfirmation. Such reductionism not only fails
to accommodate the fact that hypotheses are never tested in isolation
from background assumptions, as Quine argued (Quine (1980), 42),
but it also is clearly committed to epistemological realism, for it treats
reports and beliefs about the deliverances of our senses as having an
intrinsic epistemic priority over reports and beliefs about any would-be
moral dataindeed, over any non-observational reports and beliefs.
However, other kinds of sceptical doubts about the reality of moral
facts may appear on the surface not to be guilty of anything like this.
Take, for example, the general kind of moral scepticism that the sec17
See Davidson (Davidson (1980), 16-17).

But contrast this with the case in which I have no reason for thinking the general principle
false, but in which a sceptic undermines my positive justification for the principle. Then I lack
justification for whatever particular judgments presuppose the principle in the context of discussing
the general principle, but it does not follow that in the context of discussing the particular claims
I lack justification for them, so long as the general principle they presuppose is, in fact, true.
Knowledge may be unstable. See note 9 above and Williams (Williams (1996), chap. 8; Williams
(2001), chap. 4).
18
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ond philosopher in my little dialogue tries to press by appealing to

Mackies argument from queerness (Mackie (1977), 38-42). There
are, as Mackie notes, really two components to this argument. First,
Mackie claims that objective moral properties would be completely unlike anything else whose existence we are justified in believing in:
Platos Forms give a dramatic picture of what objective value
would have to be. The Form of the Good is such that knowledge of it provides the knower with both a direction and
an overriding motive; somethings being good both tells the
person who knows this to pursue it and makes him pursue it.
An objective good would be sought by anyone who was acquainted with it, not because of any contingent fact that this
person, or every person, is so constituted that he desires this
end, but just because the end has to-be-pursuedness somehow built into it. (40)
Thus, Mackie thinks that objective moral properties must be intrinsically motivating, so that their mere apprehension will automatically
dispose us to act in a way that we take to be morally praiseworthy and
such that their motivational power has nothing to do with contingent
facts about general or individual human psychology. This is the queerness of moral properties, for they seem in this respect quite unlike any
other properties recognized by mature science.
Second, properties that have this queerness and are, moreover, supposed to be objective, present a challenge to epistemology. How could
we come to know about such things?
[N]one of our ordinary accounts of sensory perception or
introspection or the framing and confirming of explanatory
hypotheses or inference or logical construction or conceptual analysis, or any combination of these, will provide a
satisfactory answer; a special sort of intuition is a lame answer, but it is the one to which the clear-headed objectivist
is compelled to resort. (39)
Let me focus on Mackies complaint that we do not obtain moral knowledge by way of explanatory hypotheses or inference. His point, I take
295
it, is that we are not justified in believing in the existence of objective

moral properties by an argument which takes the best explanation of
some better-known fact to be that there are such properties. Thus, the
fact that we have moral convictionsbeliefs that seem most plausibly
endorsed by praising them as trueis not best explained by the existence of moral properties, the apprehension of which induces in us such
convictions. On the contrary, says Mackie, there is a rival hypothesis
that handles all the data about human moral psychology quite well. Our
belief in the objectivity of value is really the result of our tendency to
objectify our own wants and demands (43). Moral belief involves a
kind of fetishism:19
[B]oth the adjective good and the noun goods are used
in non-moral contexts of things because they are such as to
satisfy desires. We get the notion of somethings being objectively good, or having intrinsic value, by reversing the
direction of dependence here, by making the desire depend
upon the goodness, instead of the goodness on the desire.
And this is aided by the fact that the desired thing will indeed
have features that make it desired, that enable it to arouse a
desire or that make it such as to satisfy some desire that is
already there. (43)
Thus, because there is no objectivity of value, on Mackies account, all
of our moral claimswhich we make with the conviction that there are
objective valuesprove to be false, and since we cannot know something which is not the case, we have no moral knowledge, despite our
many moral beliefs.
Mackie relies here on an underdetermination argument, for he contends that my moral experiencemy conviction that certain actions
and outcomes are right or wrongis explained as well by the hypothesis that no moral properties are instantiatedjust projectedas by the
hypothesis that moral properties are instantiated. This might remind us
19 Mackie (Mackie (1977), 42) compares his error theory to Humes view that we project
causal relations onto the world, even though they are no objective part of the world, but we might
extend the comparison to Feuerbachs discussion of God and Marxs treatment of commodities in
the first volume of Capital.
296
of the Cartesian sceptical argument: my experience as if of a world of

objects and events beyond my mind is explained just as well by my lack
of perceptual contact with such a world (by my being a brain in a vat, for
example) as it is by my being in perceptual contact with such a world,
and so, I am not justified in accepting the hypothesis of my perceptual
contact with the world. But this tempting analogy cannot be trusted to
deliver the conclusion that Mackies error theory relies on epistemological realism. Underdetermination arguments do not by themselves entail
epistemological realism. It is part of the nature of explanation that what
is to be explained must be assumed to be better known than that which
explains it. However, this assumption may well be provisional, and in
another context that which was assumed earlier may now be cast into
doubt or treated hypothetically. Only if we think that that which we
are trying to explain must be regarded as better known in all epistemic
contexts are we committed to epistemological realism.
However, Mackies view does assume that there is a kind of unity to
moral experience, such that it makes sense to suppose that such experience can be identified and described independently of the moral properties to which it ostensibly refers. Consider again Mackies contention
that we come to believe things to be morally good because we first discover that they satisfy certain of our desires. We then mistake the fact
that we desire them for their intrinsic desirability (where intrinsic desirability means that the end has to-be-pursuedness somehow built into it
(40)). What this story does not tell us is why we do not make the same
mistake in the case of non-moral goodness. Ordinarily (there are exceptions), we do not suppose that someone who does not share our taste in
desserts is failing to respond properly to some objective feature of the
world. We do not suppose that preferring hockey to rugby is a moral
failing. But if somethings seeming to be good is just an illusion caused
by our desiring it, then we ought, in fact, to be subject to the same illusion regardless of the content of the desire. Mackies argument thus
presupposes that we can identify certain of our own desires as having
moral content, quite independently of being able to identify any moral
properties in the world around us (since, after all, there are not supposed
to be any such properties instantiated). But how does anybody ever get
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to do that? Mackie seems to be relying here on the very Cartesian model

of inner experience that the sceptic about the external world is inspired
by. According to that model, my inner experience is known to me independently of the way the world is in the sense that I could have exactly
the same inner experience in the absence of what we normally regard to
be its typical causes. Likewise, it seems, on Mackies account I could
have the same inner moral experience, regardless of how the world is,
and I could tell my desires with moral content from my desires with
non-moral content without having to encounter actual moral situations
and without being trained and initiated into any particular set of moral
practices. All of my knowledge of the world, including my would-be
moral knowledge, is ultimately beholden to that which by its very nature is better knownmy inner experience.
Now Mackie might try to respond that I have misunderstood his position. There is, after all, some social or biological explanation for how
it is that we come to make the error only in the case of moral goods
and not in the case of non-moral ones:
Moral attitudes themselves are at least partly social in origin: socially establishedand socially necessarypatterns
of behaviour put pressure on individuals, and each individual tends to internalize these pressures and to join in requiring these patterns of behaviour of himself and of others. The
attitudes that are objectified into moral values have indeed
an external source, though not the one assigned to them by
the belief in their absolute authority. Moreover, there are
motives that would support objectification. We need morality to regulate interpersonal relations, to control some of the
ways in which people behave towards one another, often in
opposition to contrary inclinations. (42-3)
We learn to distinguish our desires with moral content from those with
non-moral content by means of social training in patterns of behaviour
that serve to regulate interpersonal relations, not by acquaintance with
the form of the good or by way of a special sort of intuition (39).
But it seems to me that any plausible explanation of this sort will come
298
precariously close to granting precisely those facts about the natural

history of human beings (Wittgenstein (1968), 415) that contemporary
moral realists think are all they need to make their case.20 Mackies
confession that we need this kind of regulation seems to me to concede
the most important point: the deep need for moral conventions is what
tempts us to look for moral essences, but that makes the need no less
deep.
Of course, Mackie would demur. Showing that moral desires arise
from facts about our evolutionary history or that they have their genesis
in a shared, inculcated concern for the thriving of a given social order
(or some combination of both perhaps) would not count for Mackie as
a reasonably robust version of moral realism (Braybrooke (2003c),
347). This is because when Mackie tries to bolster the case for his error
theory by undermining the moral realists hypothesis, he does so by invoking an account of moral properties drenched in the heady spirits of
Platonism, supposing that only such real essences could account for the
to-be-pursuedness (Mackie (1977), 40) of moral ends. But there is no
reason why a moral realist has to accept either the full-blown motivational internalism of such a view or the existence of real universals. To
repeat: [T]o the depth that we see in the essence there corresponds the
deep need for the convention (Wittgenstein (1978), 65). That morality
is in some sense contingent may provoke a certain attitude of irony, but
it does not deprive morality of its internal necessity.21
As I have been not-so-subtly hinting, the case here is rather like
the case of mathematical truth.22 What the mathematical conventionalist offers us is a way of making sense of the truth of mathematical
judgments that does not require us to go looking for mysterious mathematical facts in the world or beyond it. Likewise, what Braybrooke
offers us is a way of making sense of truth in ethics that does not require acquaintance with other-worldly moral facts whose epistemic ac20 See, for example, Campbell and Woodrow (Campbell and Woodrow (2003)) and Campbells
chapter in this volume.
21 One might take this as a way of trying to rephrase what I think is right about Rortys (1989)
view (Rorty (1989))and perhaps what Braybrookes view has in common with it.
22 It is no coincidence that Wittgenstein describes mathematics as a network of norms
(Wittgenstein (1978), 431).
11.6. CONCLUSION
299
cessibility is mysterious and whose motivational force seems queer.23

The motivational force of moral judgments, according to Braybrooke,
is something that derives from a prior commitment to criteria of social
thriving (Braybrooke (2003c), 346), which in turn is the historically
contingent result of evolutionary social adaptation to the conditions of
thriving (350). (And that certain practices and situations promote the
thriving of individuals and communities is, thinks Braybrooke, largely
a matter of empirical fact.)
11.6 Conclusion
I conclude that Braybrookes invocation of the ethics/meta-ethics distinction is defensible. Moral claims can be justified by reference to
moral principles even though no justification has been given for those
principles because moral principles are default-justified and cannot be
challenged without changing the context of inquiry or discussion. Consequently, if the proper application of the truth-predicate to claims is
governed by contextually specific criteria of justification, true may
be used of moral claims unselfconsciously, without thinking of metaethics (350), even though it may be applied within one structure of
ideas that figures among many logically possible structures (350). The
case of ethics is thus much like the case of mathematics, according to
one kind of conventionalism. What contextualism helps to show us is
that one can be a conventionalist (at the meta-ethical level) and a realist
(at the ethical level) at one and the same time.
23 I think the problem is exacerbated both here and in the mathematical case by commitment
to a correspondence theory of truth, but I already have too many axes in the fire (to coin an
expression).
Chapter 12
Braybrooke and the Formal

Structure of Moral Justification
T OM V INCI
Abstract
In his paper What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer to the
Open-Question Argument Leave to Moral Judgments? David Braybrooke
develops several themes in ethical theory, including an account of the nature of moral justification. I discuss his elucidation of the structure of
moral justification within a broader account of how formal foundationalism, a doctrine of the structure of epistemic justification, can provide
a useful protocol for understanding his account of the structure of moral
justification. I conclude by raising some difficulties.
12.1
Introduction
In his recent paper, What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer

to the Open-Question Argument Leave to Moral Judgments?1 David
Braybrooke develops several themes in ethical theory, including an account of the nature of moral justification. Playing supporting roles are
arguments showing that the account of justification thus developed can
give a measured response to the challenge posed by Moores openquestion argument. The account draws upon insights in Braybrookes
1
Braybrooke (2003c). Hereafter page numbers in parentheses refer to this text.
301
302
CHAPTER 12. TOM VINCI
own natural law approach to morality2 and in the classical emotiveimperative accounts of Stevenson3 and Ayer.4 There is an apparent
tension between these two theories regarding how to handle the concept
of truth in contexts of moral justification: natural law theory seems to
favour its application to moral claims; emotive-imperative theory does
not. One of Braybrookes concerns is to show how a theory that incorporates elements of both approaches assigns truth to moral claims in
ways that does violence to neither.
I approach Braybrookes paper as an epistemologist rather than an
ethical theorist. For much of the twentieth century, epistemology and
ethical theory have been concerned with apparently distinct subject
matters, each developing its own set of problems and methodsships
passing in the night. Yet there have been some close encounters in
both directions: epistemology looking to ethical theory and ethical theory looking to epistemology. An example of the former is Roderick
Chisholms program in epistemology;5 another example is virtue epistemology.6 In the other direction, one project looks at whether models
of knowledge developed within contemporary epistemology can be applied to ethics moral epistemology as it has come to be called. For
example, Robert Audi has recently catalogued various models of knowing in epistemologyempiricism, rationalism, intuitionism, and noncognitivismand considered which best fit various positions in ethical
theory. (He proposes that a moderate version of intuitionism is the best
fit for the most plausible version of ethical theory.)7
My own contribution to this volume falls within the general heading of moral epistemology. I am not, however, as Audi is, interested in
taking a substantive position in epistemology but rather in looking at a
formal account in epistemology about the way in which justification can
be transmitted from the general to the particular, Sosas formal founda2
David Braybrooke, Natural Law Modernized (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001).
(1944)
4 Ayer (1936)
5 Chisholm (1966), 11ff.
6 See, for example, Axtell (1997)
7 Audi (1999)).
3 Stevenson
12.2. BRAYBROOKE ON THE OPEN-QUESTION ARGUMENT
303
tionalism.8 The exercise in moral epistemology that I undertake here is

to suggest that formal foundationalism is embodied in Braybrookes approach to ethical justification, to develop in detail a formal foundationalist interpretation of Braybrookes account of justification, to consider
how some substantive problems arising within Braybrookes substantive ethical theory can be formulated with the model, and to show, with
the help of the model, how these problems might be resolved.
12.2 Braybrooke on the Open-Question Argument of G.E.

Moore
Braybrookes paper begins with a discussion of the open-question argument. Moore thought that if you find that something has a certain property that is not in itself evaluativethat it is pleasurable for exampleit
is then an open question whether that is good. It is notoriously difficult to give a precise definition of what Moore may have meant by this,
but Braybrooke attempts one:
If you purport to define good as pleasure or anything else,
you will be cutting off any opponent who tries to disagree,
saying to her, This is not an open question . . . no one can
think otherwise except through confusion.9
The connection between an open question and the possibility of giving a definition for good seems to be that if a question like Is pleasure
good? is an open question in the sense intended then one cannot answer
it by saying Yes it is; and that is true by definition. Moores explanation for this is that good is a primitive property; that is, it is a genuine property, something that truly characterizes things, but it is a basic
property, not analysable intohence not definable in terms ofnatural
components. Of course, classical emotivists also think that Pleasure is
good does not express a definitional truth, but they think so not because
good is a primitive term but because the sentence does not express a
truth (proposition) at allit expresses an emotion or an injunction.
8 Sosa
(1980), at 12ff.
The passage is from Braybrooke (341); the internal quotation is from G.E. Moore, Moore
(1903), 21.
9
304
Braybrooke considers several proposals among emotivist-imperativist (EI for short) theoreticians10 about what is expressed by an utterance of a declarative sentence concerning the moral status of doing X:
(1) negative feelings I have about doing X; (2) an injunction, softer perhaps than an ordinary imperative for others to feel the same way; (3) an
injunction for me to act appropriately, e.g., by way of making reparations (341). The combination of these three is what may be described
as the emotivist-imperative theory (342).
Braybrooke is not very sympathetic to the idea that when we say
Thats good truth or falsity is simply inapplicable. He notes that we
quite properly and naturally respond to moral claims by saying Thats
true (344-5) and is not sympathetic to the idea that this is a sense of
truth less robust that we apply to factual assertions (345). But Braybrooke also finds in the EI approach something that is right and valuable both in its commitment to the role of emotions and injunctions
in moral judgment and in its giving a satisfactory response to Moores
open-question argument. What is a bit tricky here, and requires careful
navigation by Braybrooke and his readers, is combining the idea that
truth is applicable in a robust sense to the objects of moral evaluation
with the idea that those objects are to be understood on the emotiveimperative model. Braybrooke does this by connecting truth and endorsement: The word True is the normal form of serious endorsement in ethics as in other branches of discourse (344). Now there is a
high road and a low road between truth and endorsement. The low road
is the truth-deflationary road: Thats true just stands in for whatever
expression that refers to anaphorically. In the case where the expression Thats good, for example, is understood as expressing an emotion
or an injunction rather than a proposition, that status is preserved even
when the expression is given in proxy form: Thats true. Indeed, Braybrooke mentions some deflationary accounts, including one of the classic redundancy versions, the pro-sentential theory,11 but does not think
that these accounts have all the goods on truth: there still seems to be
some room for endorsement that cannot be occupied by merely repeat10
He cites Stevenson, Ayer, and Hare.

et al. (1975)
11 Grover
12.2. BRAYBROOKE ON THE OPEN-QUESTION ARGUMENT
305
ing the original judgments or anaphorically signifying their repetition

(348).
But what is the high road? Soon after formulating the open-question
argument Braybrooke shifts from consideration of goodness to right and
wrong, the moral justification (or lack thereof) of actions. Retaining
from emotive-imperativism the objects of moral judgment, principally
injunctions, Braybrooke then notes that injunctions, like other actions,
can be justified or not. It is in an account of the nature of injunction
justification that Braybrooke sees truth coming into the picture as more
than an element in a redundancy use of Thats true. Endorsement is
the justification (possessing or being willing to provide same) and justification requires truth: this is the high road connecting endorsement and
truth.
For Braybrooke, moral justification attaches in the first instance to
particular injunctions, You, do x now. This attachment is secured by
three things: (1) particular injunctions are instances of general injunctions (rules) like Everyone, always do x now, (2) rules can themselves
be justified, and (3) justification somehow flows from the general to the
particular. In saying that a certain injunction is an instance of a general
rule, what we say will be either true or false. This is one way in which
a non-redundancy notion of truth appears in the account. Braybrooke
does not spend much time explaining (3) (though discussing it will occupy a major portion of the second half of this paper), focusing instead
on (2), the locus of much of the substantive ethical theorizing that occurs
in Braybrookes paper. Here, his account is broadly rule-utilitarian: the
justification of a rule consists in the positive consequences if most of
us follow the rules most of the time. The positive consequence is societal thriving. Truth (in a non-redundancy sense) comes in here, too,
for the second time: it will be either true or false that a certain rule,
universally followed, will lead to thriving, given a determinate account
of what thriving is.
But this is the end of the line for truth and facticity: there is no fact
of the matter about which conception of thriving is the right one. Braybrooke makes a case that moral justification depends on commitments
to a conception of human thriving which can in principle vary as widely
306
as the limits of the human will and imagination. No one commitment, or

set of commitments, is given exclusive status (347). What I take this to
mean is that, if, after giving the matter as much and as good thought as
I am able, I say that I am committed to a conception of societal thriving
in which the weak and infirm are left to die, there is no replying, You
are wrong: that is not a moral commitment. If that is Braybrookes
view, it is one that I am sympathetic with: I also think that room must
be found for individual, existential choices in the foundations of moral
conduct. But that is not the issue I propose to explore here; rather, I wish
to explore the proposal Braybrooke has made about the formal structure
of moral justification and his claim that a solution to the open-question
argument can be found in the emotive-imperative theory of normative
discourse.
We will find that the structure of moral justification Braybrooke proposes fits the model known in epistemology as formal foundationalism and that the solution which the EI theory affords for the openquestion problem lies in the doctrine of persuasive definition advanced
within a version of the EI theory by Stevenson. I will argue that employing a version of the doctrine of persuasive definition endorsed
by Braybrooke in the logical context of formal foundationalism leads
to a difficulty for Braybrookes account of moral justification akin to
Moores original naturalistic fallacy. This result, if correct, has special
significance for Braybrooke since he states, in the very first sentence
of the paper,12 that although there is life left in Moores open-question
argument, properly understood in emotivist-imperativist terms, the naturalistic fallacy is dead.
In the next section I begin the exploratory task.
12.3
Explorations
We have already seen that on Braybrookes reading, Moore treats an

open question as one that we cannot respond to by saying that a certain
12 The emotive-imperative theory of moral judgments invites treatment as a response to the
problem exposed by G.E. Moores open question argument, which remains in the field after the
associated charge is refuted that it is a naturalistic fallacy to identify good with any descriptive
characteristic (341).
12.3. EXPLORATIONS
307
claim is true by definition. In this sense Moore claimed that questions

of the form I agree that x is F, but is it good? where F is any descriptive predicate, constitute an open question: we cannot settle the matter
simply by saying that F things are good is true by definition. More precisely, Moore argued that (1) any definition of good of the form X is
good = df. X is F, where F is a descriptive predicate, is either incorrect
or circular. Assuming that (2) is good is a genuine predicate (genuine
predicates assign properties to the subjects of propositions) occurring
in a genuine subject-predicate proposition, Moore argued validly that
goodness is a primitive property, our understanding of which must come
from some source other than explicit definition, for example, a special
kind of apprehension of goodness. Braybrooke finds the notion of a
special kind of moral apprehension objectionablehe does not say why
in detail, mentioning a preference for Wittgenstein (346). In any case,
let us accept that moral apprehension in Moores sense is not a resource
available to us in our attempt to resolve Moores point about defining
good.
Traditional naturalists would, of course, simply reject premise (1),
claiming, instead, that there is a single correct definition of the sort
Moore denies. If I understand Braybrookes response to both traditional
naturalists and to Moore, it is that Moore is wrong when he says that
no correct, non-circular, naturalistic definition of evaluative language is
possible, and naturalists are wrong when they say that there is a single
such naturalistic, non-circular definition of evaluative discourse. Braybrookes point takes advantage of the logical fact that in addition to one
and none there is the possibility of some. Braybrookes position, then,
is that there could be a range of naturalistic definitions of evaluative
language. In the case of the language of rule justification, the range is
determined by the conceptions of thriving to which various people using
such language are committed.
Now, this account may not, technically, be a form of moral relativism,13 nor does Braybrooke describe it as such, but it is a close
cousin. Like relativism, the definition form, if not each definition individually, requires specification of a conception of thriving that is sup13
Thanks to Michael Hymers for helpful suggestions around the issue of relativism.
308
plied freely by the agent. The effect of this is that the truth of specific
judgment formulations, Doing X is wrong, will vary relative to the different extraneous commitments of moral agents. Whether we say that
this variability is due to the assertions taking on different meanings in
a way that systematically varies with these commitments or that it is
due to assertions having the same meanings but with an extra parameter in underlying logical form systematically varying with these commitments, the point is still that truth varies with parameters supplied
from outside. As evidence that Braybrooke recognizes the relativismlike characteristics of his account, I note that he spends considerable
time in mitigating the consequences of his account for those who would
be squeamish about moral relativism (348-9).
Finally, we come to the matter of the justification of particular injunctions. On Braybrookes account these get their justification derivatively, by being instances of justified rules. So, showing that a particular
injunction, You, do X now, proceeds in two stages. First, there is the
justification of the basic injunction, You, do X now, what Braybrooke
calls moral judgments of the first instance, by appeal to the fact that
this injunction falls under a general rule, Always do X in circumstances
C (345). Then there is the justification of the rule itself. The following
two propositions represent these two stages:
A The injunction You, do X now is morally justified in circumstances C if there is a morally justified general rule, Always do X
in circumstances C.
B The rule Always do X in circumstances C is morally justified iff
the general practice of following the rule will promote the thriving
of society according to a conception T of thriving.
Following Stevenson, proposition B is intended by Braybrooke to involve a persuasive definition (347n22). A persuasive definition does
not purport to report logical equivalences in a set of antecedently existing concepts but is a stipulation of how one will use language, the
upshot of which is that we are committed to replace occurrences of the
definiendum with occurrences of the definiens in ordinary (non-metalinguistic, non-modal, etc.) contexts. Persuasive definitions are not,
12.3. EXPLORATIONS
309
therefore, true or false. We can then take B as the definition form for
which various specific versions are possible depending on which conception of thriving we specify. Different people will now choose different definitions depending on which conception of thriving they are
committed to. Proposition A does not seem intended as a definition but
serves, rather, to express the way in which particular injunctions receive
justification from general injunctions.
There is, however, some question of exactly how proposition B involves a persuasive definition. We have been operating on the assumption that what is being stipulated in B is the meaning of the words on the
left side of the biconditional, The rule, Always do X in circumstances
C, is morally justified. This is what the solution to the open-question
problem suggestsmany possible definitions of the evaluative language
on the left side of a definition form, x is EV iff x is F, where EV is a
suitable evaluative term and F is a suitable descriptive predicate. This
reading is also suggested by the following passage:
what . . . Stevenson called a persuasive definition, [was] in
this case, that wrong is at bottom a matter of running against
the thriving . . . of ones society. There could be other persuasive definitions, for example, unattractive ones like the one
that makes wrong at bottom a matter of interfering with the
plans and activities of the Ubermenschen,

or innumerable
silly ones, like making wrong at bottom a matter of drinking
tar water and passing up beans. (343)
I will call this the full-substitution reading of the role of stipulative
definitions in Braybrookes account of moral justification. There is,
however, a second reading on which the scope of substitution by stipulation is less than the entire left side of the definition but is, rather,
confined to replacing occurrences of T in the definition.14 If I stipulate
that by thriving I mean non-interference with the plans and activities
of the Uebermenschen,
then the only substitution that gets made is a replacement of the former by the latter. Call this the partial-substitution
reading.
14
Thanks to Richmond Campbell for suggesting it.
310
There are reading has its advantages and disadvantages. The fullsubstitution reading gives a justification for statement Bit is true by
stipulation-but generates a problem with the justification of particular
injunctions, a problem I develop later. The partial-substitution reading
avoids the validity problem but raises another: what justification can
now be offered for the biconditional comprising statement B if it is no
longer true by stipulation? The latter problem seems the more damaging to Braybrookes program, at least to its meta-ethical dimension, a
dimension to which Braybrooke assigns considerable importance (347,
350). So, until further notice, I shall operate with the full-substitution
reading.
I now turn to a discussion of meta-ethics, its various forms, and what
role, if any, it plays in Braybrookes account. This topic, of interest in
its own right, will also serve as a bridge to epistemology and the notion
of formal foundationalism, an account of the structure of epistemic
justification that I plan to use in section 6 as a model for interpreting
Braybrookes account of the structure of moral justification.
12.4
Three Conceptions of Meta-ethics
I begin with a general discussion of the notions of meta-ethics and

meta-language. A meta-language is a language that contains terms that
refer to words and contains sentences that say various things about the
words that are referred to by the terms. Thus, the sentence This sentence has more than one word is a sentence in a meta-language because
the term this sentence refers to words and this sentence says something about those words. What is the relation between the concepts
meta-ethics and meta-language? Braybrookes account of the former is
brief:
In meta-ethics, the possibility of alternative definitions of
good and other moral terms is firmly established. Asking
the open question of what is seized upon to define good as
in Is this really good? amounts to asking Couldnt good
be defined otherwise?, which is the counterpart in metaethics of Is this really good?, and displaces it. (347)
12.4. THREE CONCEPTIONS OF META-ETHICS
311
The second question is meta-linguistic, involving mention of the

word good in formulating the definition; the first question is not. It
looks as if, on Braybrookes treatment, the distinction between ethics
and meta-ethics rests on the distinction between a first-order language
and its meta-language. Call this the first conception of meta-ethics.
But now suppose that we reformulate the definitions in a way that
uses but does not mention good; thus, X is good iff . . . Because
this is not a meta-linguistic statement, the development of this definition would not be occurring within meta-ethics on the present suggestion. This seems unduly restrictive of the conception of meta-ethics
Braybrooke is invoking since a successful outcome to the definitional
task would still not entail the truth of particular judgments of the form
Doing X is morally unjustified/justified. Determining the truth of
such ascriptions is an important task traditionally assigned to what has
been called normative ethics, a discourse usually contrasted with metaethics. So perhaps we can say that normative ethics is concerned with
determining the truth of propositions assigning the justification predicate to particular actions; meta-ethics is concerned with arguing for the
truths of various propositions, definitions, and other such things, that do
not entail the truth of categorical propositions assigning moral justification to particular actions. We shall call this the second conception of
meta-ethics.
It will prove helpful to compare meta-ethics so understood with another parallel enterprise, meta-epistemology. Meta-epistemology is often regarded as the theory that deals with questions of whether and
how first-order knowledge or justification ascriptions are themselves
known or justified. For example, if the way things look yields prima
facie justification for the way things are, how is the statement of that
propositionIf it looks as though p to S, then S is prima facie justified in believing that pitself justified? Various answers could be
proposed; and the discourse in which answers are discussed is usually called meta-epistemology. Notice that meta-epistemological discourse need not be meta-linguistic15 (although in the present case it is),
15 For example, we can ask, If I know that p do I know that I know that p? This is a central
question in meta-epistemology but is not formulated meta-linguistically.
312
thus showing a disanalogy with the first conception of meta-ethics; but

notice also that the propositions established in meta-epistemology ascribe properties of (epistemic) justification to subjects, thus showing a
disanalogy with even the second conception of meta-ethics. The distinction I have in mind is best characterized in terms of the language of
first-order and second-order discourse. This same language can also
be applied to ethics. I will employ the terminology second-order ethical discourse when the issue is whether a first-order claim that doing X
is justified is itself justified. Since definitions need not be second-order
(though of course they may be), definitions can be framed and deployed
in first-order ethical or epistemological discourse. Second-order ethical
discourse therefore comprises a third conception of meta-ethics.
12.5
A Side Trip to Epistemology
In epistemology we might be interested in whether someones assertion

is epistemically justified, whether he has a right, epistemically speaking,
to say what he says. We might also be interested in whether a certain
proposition is justified in relation to other statements that potentially
could serve as evidence. Whichever subject we choose, the property
of epistemic justification has to come from somewhere. There are two
potential sources of justification. (1) The first source consists of a true
conditional of the form Given that X meets certain conditions, then X is
epistemically justified, where X is a proposition or an assertion, taken
together with a clause affirming that the antecedent is true. The principles can take the form of (a) biconditionals, in which case they count as
definitions , or (b) one-way conditionals, in which case they are called
warrant principles . (2) The second source for justification attaching
to an assertion or a proposition is by transmission from other justified
propositions. The most basic candidate for a transmission principle is
some variant on If x entails y and x is justified then y is justified. Principles of this kind are entailment transmission principles. I shall bypass
some of the most intensely argued controversies in contemporary epistemology and simply postulate that the basic entailment transmission
principle (the one given in italics) is true.
12.5. A SIDE TRIP TO EPISTEMOLOGY
313
Formal foundationalism16 is the doctrine that any demonstration that

an entity is justified must proceed deductively in an orderly fashion employing warrant principles to establish non-inferential justification and
then applying transmission principles recursively, first to non-inferentially justified entities to produce inferentially justified entities, and then to
inferentially justified entities to establish more inferentially justified entities. Formal foundationalism is broader than traditional foundationalism. Coherentism, for example, counts as a version of formal foundationalism, but not substantive foundationalism. (Suppose that a coherentist employs the following definition of justification: x is justified iff
x is an element of a maximally coherent set of beliefs.17 This definition
can then be used as one premise in a deductive proof that a given belief
is justified; the other premise would assert that the belief is in fact an
element in a maximally coherent set of beliefs.)
Now consider the following reasoning typically proposed by an epistemologist interested in the epistemology of perception:18
Reasoning Pattern A
(1a) (S)(p) If it looks to S as though p, then S is prima facie justified in
believing that p.
(2a) It looks to Jones as though there is an apple on the table.
(3a) No counter-reasons against the proposition that there is an apple
on the table are available to Jones. Therefore,
(4a) Jones is justified in believing that there is an apple on the table.
This argument is valid (given a suitable understanding of prima facie
justification) and line (1) is a warrant principle. If all the premises are
true we have demonstrated the truth of the first-order epistemic assertion
at line (4) in accord with the protocol of formal foundationalism. (The
justification at line [4] is non-inferential since no transmission principle
16
17
The term and account is due to Sosa. See Sosa (1980) at 12ff.
The position that I presenting here is a simplified version of Laurence Bonjour (1985), 87-
18
John Pollock (1974): the position he calls descriptivism, 56 ff.
93.
314
has been employed in the proof.) Of course the question arises whether
the premises are true. If pressed as to the principle at line (1), for example, I could, if I am schooled in epistemology, give a reply, perhaps
along the lines of
5a (1a) is justified because it leads to consequences that best accord
with our commonsense epistemic intuitions.
Line (5a) is a second-order epistemic claim, the argument for which
occurs in meta-epistemology. But I do not need to be able do metaepistemology in order to have demonstrated that Joness belief that there
is an apple on the table is justified: saying in response to a request for a
defence of (1) Thats another question is a legitimate way to terminate
a dialogue without abandoning the legitimacy of ones claim to (4a).
Now consider the following pattern of reasoning:
Reasoning Pattern B
(1b) Whenever it looks to S as though p and there are no countervailing
indications, then p is true.
(2b) It looks to me as though an apple is on the table.
(3b) No countervailing indications are present. Therefore,
(4b) There is an apple on the table.
Suppose that Jones believes (4b) and we ask her to justify the claim.
Suppose that initially she offers the premises (2b) and (3b). But now I
am dissatisfied with the answer because the argument as it stands is not
formally valid and I want to find out what premise Jones might offer to
remedy this. Jones provides (1b). Finally, suppose that all the premises
are true and that Jones believes them all. Is Jones now justified in believing that there is an apple on the table? Notice that the conclusion of
this reasoning does not assert that she is, unlike the case with pattern A.
If she is justified, what would the source of the justification be? In this
case it is an inference. Formal foundationalism says that justification
has to come from one of two sourcesa warrant principle or by inference from a justified belief in accord with an acceptable transmission
12.6. THE MAIN LINE OF ADVANCE RESUMED
315
principle. A consequence of this view is that all steps in an inference, I,

to a conclusion, C, must be justified if C is to be justified. This means
that the explicit representation of a case of inferential justification must
ascend one level from that of pattern B (no justification property attributed: 0-level) to an argument containing premises that do attribute
justification to statements (first-order epistemic statements):
Reasoning Pattern C
(1c) Statement (1b) is justified for Jones.
Therefore (by a transmission rule),
Pattern C is the pattern of argument that is needed if inferential justification is to be demonstrated of a proposition. It is important to note
that although the premises of this argument have to be true, there is no
requirement that there be second-order justificationfor example, that
statement (1c) be itself justified for Jones. So, all the steps in pattern
C fall within first-order epistemology. Also, note that because of the
difference between being justified and giving a justification, there is no
requirement that Jones give the justification alluded to in each of (1c)(3c).
12.6
The Main Line of Advance Resumed
We are now in a position to return to the main line of advance. Recall

the two stages in Braybrookes account of moral justification:
A The injunction You, do X now is morally justified in circumstances C if there is a morally justified general rule, Always do X
in circumstances C.
B The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, is morally justified iff
the general practice of following the rule will promote the thriving
of society according to a conception T of thriving.
316
Sentence A does not express a definition; sentence B does express a

definition, a stipulative definition. Recall that a stipulative definition
is neither true nor false but expresses a commitment on the part of the
person making the stipulation to replace occurrences of the definiendum
with occurrences of the definiens in normal contexts. Braybrooke relies
on both A and B in his account of moral warrant. First, there is the stage
of an agent a endorsing the particular injunction, You, do X now, accomplished by appeal to the general rules. This is the first place where
truth comes in. Endorsement expresses warrant, in this case, moral warrant:
1 The particular injunction, You, do X now, is morally justified in
circumstances C.
Where does the warrant come from? Braybrookes answer: inference
from a general rule. Although injunctions are not propositions and do
not, therefore, admit straightforwardly of logical implication, I shall
suppose that there is something analogous to the relation of logical
implication holding between the rule, Always do X in circumstances
C, and the injunction, You, do X now, when circumstances C obtain.
With this in hand in the theory of moral warrant there will be a protocol analogous to formal foundationalism in epistemology. (There is one
difference: factual premisesfor example, those asserting that conditions in a rule are metare not, of course, justified in the same category
of justification as is being transmitted, namely, moral justification of
injunctions.) We can see from Braybrookes account that he in effect
is relying on this protocol in his theory of moral warrant because he
supposes that the warrant of particular injunctions is inferred from the
warrant of general rules, and that the warrant of the latter is asserted by
a warrant principle, specifically a definition, sentence B. The first stage
of the reasoning can be expressed as follows:
Reasoning Pattern D
(1d) The rule Always do X in circumstances C is morally justified.
Therefore,
317
(2d) The particular injunction, You, do X now, is morally justified in

circumstances C,
in the presence of a principle asserting that justification is transmitted
by the analogue for injunctions of logical implication. This pattern of
reasoning fits pattern Coccurring within first-order moral discourse.
That is, no ascent to meta-ethics, third conception, occurs here.
Then there is the stage of endorsing the rule itself: this amounts to
showing that (1) is true. Here Braybrooke appeals to its ability to promote thriving (of the right kind) in society. If the rule does indeed promote thriving in societyif it is true that the rule promotes thriving
then, according to Braybrooke, that is a second place in which truth
comes into the account:
A rule cited to warrant a moral judgment praising an honest
action is endorsed as according with the appropriate grounds
or criteria for adopting such a rule, the criteria or grounds
for justifying it. Here the place of truth is secure, whether
or not what is justified by the justification are themselves
truth-bearers, as in some cases, they clearly are not. (345)
Here, there is also an argument. Taking into account the role of agent
commitment as a parameter in statements of the argument, we have the
following:
Argument E
(1e) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, promotes the thriving
of society on conception T of thriving.
(2e) The definition, The rule Always do X in circumstances C is morally
justified = df The general practice of following the rule will promote the thriving of society according to a conception T of thriving, is selected by agent a.
Therefore,
(3e) The rule Always do X in circumstances C is morally justified for
agent a.
318
Line (2e) is the warrant definition; line (1e) provides an auxiliary

empirical premise, yielding the conclusion, line (3e). Line (3e) is noninferentially justified in the formal foundationalist sense. (No transmission principle is used here.) Note that even at line (2e), the place
where Braybrooke finds an excursion into meta-ethics (350), there is
no second-order attribution of justification, hence no meta-ethical discourse conceived in the third way.
We now combine the two stages into a single argument. A moral
agent, making this argument explicit, would say the following:
Argument F
(1f) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, promotes the thriving
of society on conception T of thriving, which I accept.
(2f) I hereby stipulate that the words, The rule Always do X in circumstances C is morally justified, will mean the same as the
words, The general practice of following the rule will promote
the thriving of society according to a conception T of thriving.
Therefore,
(3f) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, is morally justified
(1f, 2f, commitment inherent in making the stipulative definition).
(4f) I hereby make the injunction You, do X now.
(5f) Circumstances C obtain.
Therefore,
(6f) The injunction, You, do X now, is morally justified. (3f, 4f, 5f
and a suitable transmission principle for injunction-warrant)
This is the theory of moral warrant that Braybrooke set out to achieve
characterized in terms of formal foundationalism. Apart from relatively
minor disagreements around the issue of meta-ethics, my verdict is, So
far so good. But I now wish to make a more serious criticism of the
proposal, centring on the special characteristics of stipulative defini-
319
tions.19 Stipulative definitions, as we have seen, are conventions, commitments to replace one set of words (the definiendum) with another (the
definiens) in normal contexts. The underlying logical form of a stipulative definition is not a biconditional but an injunction. In the case of the
stipulations regarding the language of rule justification at issue here, the
commitment is this:
Commitment made in stipulating a definition of rule justification
The stipulator is committed to replacing, in normal contexts,
the words, The rule, Always do X in circumstances C is
morally justified, with the words, The general practice of
following the rule will promote the thriving of society according to a conception T of thriving.
It follows from this commitment that our agent is committed to replacing the words, The rule, Always do X in circumstances C is
morally justified, in line (3f) with the words, The general practice of
following the rule will promote the thriving of society according to a
conception T of thriving, yielding
(3f*) The general practice of following the rule will promote the thriving of society according to a conception T of thriving.
But now the inference expressed in argument F*argument F* is obtained from argument F by replacing (3f) with (3f*)aborts. Note that
argument F successfully confers inferential justification on the particular injunction at line (6f), as intended. This is because argument F
correctly employs a transmission principle to get from (3f) to (6f). But
argument F* fails to confer inferential justification at line (6f) for the
19 Mike Hymers has raised doubts about whether I have the notion of stipulative definition
right here. He suggests four alternative accounts: that the definition might be simply latent in
our moral practices; that we might invoke a theory of implicit definitions; that we might simply
be able to re-substitute the left side of the definition for the right after having done the reverse
following our commitment in making the stipulation in the first place; and that the definition
might be understood as a meaning postulatean analytic statementin Carnaps sense. All of
these are interesting suggestions but it is not clear that they are primarily suggestions for me rather
than for Braybrooke. In any case, they all require careful responses which shall have to be left for
another occasion.
320
reason that there is no justification present in line (3f*) to be transmitted.20 (Readers will note that this problem is akin to that identified by
Moore under the heading of the naturalistic fallacy.) So Braybrookes
account of a structure of reasoning by means of which we can show
how particular injunctions acquire their moral justification, formulated
within the protocol of formal foundationalism and in terms of the fullsubstitution reading, fails.
There is, however, as noted above in section 2, an alternative reading of the scope of substitution in the stipulative definitions, the partialsubstitution reading. On this reading we are required to replace, not the
whole left side by the whole right side of a definition, but only occurrences of the thriving parameter (T) with specific kinds of thriving to
which our speaker is committed. In the case of argument F this means
that the speaker is not committed to replacing 3f with 3f*, so a crucial
move in the objection fails: the account of how particular injunctions
acquire justification on the formal foundationalist model still stands, in
the form of argument G:
Argument G
(1g) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, is morally justified
iff the rule, Always do X in circumstances C, promotes societal
thriving.
(2g) I stipulate that by societal thriving I mean T.
(3g) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, is morally justified
iff the rule, Always do X in circumstances C, promotes T. (substitution by stipulation)
(4g) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, promotes T.
20 I anticipate the following objection: A correct definition, A = df B is always
symmetricalone can replace the left side by the right, but also the right side by the left. So, in the
present case, we simply replace f* by f, thus re-introducing the required injunction-justification
premise. I reply that this holds only for reportive definitions, not stipulative definitions. The former are, if successful, true necessary bi-conditionals; the latter are not true statements at all, hence
are not necessarily true biconditionals. They are, rather, commitments to act in certain waysand
the ways are asymmetrical.
12.7. AN ALTERNATIVE BRIEFLY CONSIDERED
321
(5g) The rule, Always do X in circumstances C, is morally justified.

(3g, 4g)
(6g) I now say: You, do X now; and circumstances C obtain.
(7g) The injunction, You, do X now is morally justified (5g, 6g, and
a suitable transmission rule).
However, this benefit is achieved at a costas mentioned in section 2,
we no longer have as an answer to the question, What justification can
you offer for (1g)?, that it is true by stipulation. The challenge, arising
within meta-ethics (third conception) is, With what are we to replace it?
12.7 An Alternative Briefly Considered

I wish to pursue, very briefly, an alternative formulation of the theory
of warrant being pressed by Braybrooke that avoids this problem. This
formulation takes note of the fact that we often attribute instrumentally
evaluative predicates to individuals in relation to certain sub-categories
within a general category that they exemplify. Thus we can speak of
a good sports car, meaning that it is good as a sports car (though
not, perhaps, as a touring car.) The notion of good car simpliciter is
undefined. In the spirit of this we might think of defining what it is for a
given general injunction to be a good moral injunction. On the present
suggestion this means that the injunction would be good as a moral
injunction, good for the purposes which such injunctions serve. At this
point one might plausibly have recourse to the conception of natural
law underlying Braybrookes program in the present paper, namely, that
moral injunctions, when followed, serve to promote societal thriving.
An injunction, Always keep promises, for example, might plausibly be
thought to serve such purposes, and thus be good as a moral injunction.
This could be phrased alternatively by saying that the rule, Always keep
promises, understood as a moral injunction (as opposed to some other
kindprudential, authoritarian, etc.) is justified. Unfortunately, relative
instrumental justification of this sort does not seem to be transmissible
to particular injunctions, for it does not follow that because a general
322
rule, when followed, will promote societal thriving, so will a particular

injunction when it is followed.
I conclude that the task of providing a theory of moral warrant within
the protocol of formal foundationalism, based on the EI theory of ethics
and adequate to dispelling Moores allegation of a naturalistic fallacy,
remains still prospective.
Chapter 13
David Braybrooke On the Track of

PPE
P ETER K. S CHOTCH
Abstract
David Braybrooke has long been interested in the project of applying
moral philosophy to social science. In this essay I attempt to show how
various bits and pieces of his lifes work actually might be seen as accomplishing that far-reaching aim. Part of the difficulty which others have
encountered with such central pieces as the theory of rules presented in
Logic on the Track of Social Change, has more to do with the formality of the presentation of that material (which the authors admit demands
at least some technical facility on the part of the reader and a considerable store of good-will besides). In order that these same difficulties not
reappear, the Track theory is presented in a (new) graphic format which
simplifies the concepts but not to the point of triviality. Within this newly
minted approach, various issues are raised including a novel presentation
of some well-trodden moral theory and the place of political economy in
a rule-based picture of morals.
13.1
Introduction
When I came to Dalhousie in 1972, my relationship with David Braybrooke went through a shake-down period during which we were both
wondering what to make of each other. I was a brash young man and
323
324
CHAPTER 13. PETER SCHOTCH
David was the established major figurethe power of the department

even though he wasnt then (nor was he ever) the administrative leader.
We each had misgivings about the other, although perhaps misgivings is too strong a word since it implies a lack of openness, or perhaps
even of goodwill and neither of those obtained. For his part, David had
been dismayed by certain trends in the technical end of philosophy
trends away from applications and toward the philosophical equivalent
of so-called pure mathematics. For my part, I had been similarly dismayed by the eagerness of some moral and other philosophers to dismiss my work as not being real philosophy. So the stage was set for
us to start off on the wrong foot.
Instead, I discovered that David was glad to have my counsel on
certain matters that involved deploying formal methods in some of his
projects, and David discovered that I was delighted to make whatever
mutations seemed necessary in order that some existing formalism actually have a useful application. Both experiences were novel to each of
us.
At a later stage in our cooperation, we moved into an entirely new
mode in which the formal work did not consist of applying (perhaps
with some modifications) an off-the-shelf theory, but the construction
of a new theory virtually from scratch, the shape of which was dictated
by the application, or series of applications. In a project like Logic on
the Track of Social Change (referred to as Track in the sequel) some
formalism would be proposed to fit initial requirements and then might
change substantially as the requirements were refined over time.
What I intend to do in this essay harks back to the very first time I
heard David Braybrooke speak publicly about his philosophical aims.
On that occasion he said that he was interested in the possibility of applying moral philosophy to social science. I was struck then by the
scope of this project and remain stricken to this very day.
In what follows I shall revisit this ambition to apply philosophy. In
the version I preach, it will be the philosophy mainly expanded in Track
and some of its successor pieces. It might be a stretch for some to accept
that this philosophy is in fact moral philosophy though there is this to
be said for it: For the most part it will be philosophy in which David
13.2. HOW TRACK CAME ABOUT
325
Braybrooke had a hand or at least an interest.

Though much of what I say will bend in the direction of the technical, I will present the latter in graphical, rather than the more forbidding
algebraic, form. In the interest of readability, if not comprehensibility I will content myself with a gloss whenever that is possible without
producing a mere caricature.
13.2 How Track Came About

Its all very well to give an account of how the various bits of Track and
some of its later exfoliations connect with David Braybrookes work in
the larger sense, but what sort of position should we grant Track itself?
Is it
a project to which Braybrooke committed himself at a fairly
late stage in his careera project, moreover, that can (arguably) be detached (at least very largely) from the projects
(in moral, social, and political philosophy) which preoccupied him in earlier periods.
No it isnt. In fact this view of things, though representative of a
body of opinion against which Track labored in vain, is remarkably out
of touch with Braybrookes work. We knew on the day that Track would
challenge a number of accepted ways of doing things but we hoped that
with enough of what we called good will, people could be brought to
see that the struggle with the formalism was worth-while in the end. Unfortunately, it must be admitted, we seriously over-estimated the amount
of good will upon which we might draw.
The Track project grew out of Braybrookes long time interest in the
notion of a rule in general, and of a social rule in particular. Anybody
who thinks this interest may be detached from the rest of Braybrookes
thought without any great violence to the whole, hasnt done his homework. But let us do ours.
That David Braybrookes interest in rules dates from his earliest
work, needs no further documentation. Instead we need to show that
a willingness to employ formal methods in pursuing an account of rules
326
is not something which belongs only to some hypothetical later period.

Providing one is not prepared to date such a period to include 1969a
very brave exegetical hypothesis that would be, we need only notice
the use that Braybrooke makes of the formalism of G.H. von Wright1
in his paper Braybrooke (1969), and in his Braybrooke (1970).
In a nutshell, the program of Track is to bolster these earlier attempts at showing how the notion of a rule can figure in certain kinds
of historical explanation. In fact the various case studies that form the
core of Track are very much to that point.
But there is another reason for Braybrooke to look for aid and comfort among the formal philosophers: Though many and various are
those who seek to call upon the concept of a rule to do this or that
theoretical work, fewer by far are those who are prepared to offer a definition. Now of course there are bound to be those who say that we know
perfectly well what a rule is and dont require a definition, especially a
formal one, but Braybrooke is not among their number.
The first attempts to define a rule, as for instance a pattern of norms
or a context dependent family of imperatives would seem, on no very
deep appreciation of the concepts involved, to be circular. So rule talk
looks to be all of a piece with norm talk and imperative talk, which
makes things messy, to say the least. It also explains why so few philosophers attempt a definition. It is at exactly this point, the point where
things are messy, that a formal approach can be helpful. It is quite true
that rigor is sometimes the enemy of clarity, but when there is no clarity
to begin with, it is sometimes wise to fall back on rigor. And clarity
may appear in the end after the rigorous approach has been pursued far
enough.
In fact, we contend that this is precisely what happened in the case of
rules. It is not so easy for the casual reader to detect this since in Track
the order of reasons gets scrambled, as it nearly always does once we
go from the research to the write-up. The chapter, largely informal,
which introduces our (non-circular) account of rules comes before the
formal chapters which introduce the logic of rules. Historically it was
the other way about, and it is no exaggeration to say that we wouldnt
1 As
developed in his ?
13.3. THE BASIC SET-UP
327
The Set of Alternative Social States
You are here
Figure 13.1: The Space of Alternative Social States
have hit on the former were it not for our struggles to get the latter
correct, or at least not obviously incorrect.
13.3
The Basic Set-up
So lets do some social science. We shall conceive of our subject as

widely as possible in terms of a certain set of objectsthe objects studied by social scientists. Now of course this is a considerable idealization, that all of the social sciences are really concerned with one sort
of object, but perhaps the stretch isnt quite as broad as one might first
expect. These objects we shall call, following K. J. Arrow, the set of
alternative social states understood as the objects with respect to which
the state-variables, however we conceive these, receive a value.2
2 There
is an analogy to be made here with the phase space approach to physical science.
328
13.4
How to Apply Moral Philosophy
Morality, at bottom, is an account of what we ought to do. Obviously it

is situationalit would be a bizarre moral code which, in every set of
circumstances demanded precisely the same action on our part. Somebody might say that morality does exactly that, by demanding that we
always do the right thing, but this is disingenuous in the extreme. Half,
or more of the battle is the determination of which thing (or things) are
rightin this or that circumstance.
There are different kinds of morality and hence moral philosophy
springs into being. It might be better to say that there are many apparently different moral codes. Or perhaps decodes would be better still.
One single moral principle The greatest good for the greatest number, or Harmony with nature etc. might be understood, at the level
of ordinary life, in dozens of ways which at least seem distinct. These
unpackings of over-arching principles are what we typically mean when
we talk of moral codes.3
Now we get an inkling of how moral philosophy can be applied
to social science: The latter describes the phase space of alternative
social states, while the former tells us what we ought to do in this or
that circumstance. This is to prescribe an action (or series of actions)
given that we find ourselves in an alternative social state which satisfies
some specified condition or set of conditions.
13.5
Actions
But doing things, either what we ought to do or some other thing, results in moving from one alternative social state to another. So knowing
what to do (or at least what we ought to do) is tantamount to knowing
which alternative social state is to be (or at least ought to be) selected as
our new home, given that we find ourselves in such-and-such a present
alternative social state.
3 And it might be no exaggeration to say that how exactly a principle is to be unpacked is the
fundamental problem of practical ethics.
13.5. ACTIONS
329
termination set
Intermediate States
Starting State
Figure 13.2: The Ice-Cream Cone Semantics of Action
The picture just presented demands clarification and qualification,

much of which will require another occasion, but this we can say right
away: It is not, in general, possible to specify in advance with precision
just what the consequences of (a given agent) performing a certain action (action type) will be. The best we can do in ordinary circumstances
is to specify some range of states within which the result of performing
the action type in question will lie.
The semantics of action is thus a complicated business and not,
perhaps, for the faint of heart or the impatient. But in keeping with
our present graphical slant on things, one picture will answer all but the
most determinedly technical questions.
Indeed this picture explains why the approach is often described as
the ice cream cone semantics.
The apex of the cone, its originating point, is what we call the starting state of the action. The cone proper contains the only states which (if
any can) can be active while the action is being performed. We some-
330
times say that these are the only states in which the action might be
running once it has been started (if it starts at all) in its starting state.
This should not be taken to mean that each of the cone states will in fact
be visited, only that no other state will be. Similarly, the ice-cream part
contains the only states which can result (if any do) after the action is
performed. We might think of the ice-cream states as the ones that can
be reached (if any can) by performing the action beginning in the starting state. Similarly the cone states are those through which we might
pass as a result of performing the action beginning in the starting state
(if indeed the action can begin there). This picture of the action is decidedly non-deterministic but that can be taken to reflect only our lack
of knowledge about what the other actors will do in the circumstances
contemplated by the picture we here present.4
Compared to the literature (on the formal theory of actions), this
account is new in adding the cone. In other words, previous accounts
characterize actions entirely in terms of which states result once the action had been performed (providing that it can be performedthere is
no guarantee of this in general). So for these theories, actions are essentially and only what we might term bringings about. We, on the other
hand, characterize actions not simply in terms of what they bring about,
but also in terms of how they bring about whatever it is, if anything, that
they do. Our view is perhaps closer to common sense, even though
such a remark is sometimes thought pejorative in connection with formal work. For us, two distinct actions might bring about precisely the
same result. This would also seem to be the burden of a number of old
sayings many of which involve violence to cats.
Just what happens when we string a series of actions together (by
concatenation as we saywith the resulting object often referred to as
a concatenate) is nearly but not exactly what you think will happen.
Another picture will help.
In this we see that the cones (intermediate states to give them their
technical title) get aggregated into a kind of super-cone for the concatenate. In addition, all the ice cream of the last actions in the se4 This leaves open the question of whether or not the non-determinism runs deeper than the
epistemican important question no doubt but one that we have been glad to dodge.
13.5. ACTIONS
331
INTermediate set for concatenation

TERMination set for concatenation
not part of the concatenation
...
...
...
Figure 13.3: Concatenating Actions
quence (termination states in the parlance of Track) gets lumped into

one objecta sundae perhaps? This leaves open only the fate of the intermediate bits of ice-cream, the ones that are not shaded in the picture.
They, it might seem a trifle odd to say, are not part of the concatenate
at all. There is a technical reason to prefer things this way5 but we shall
appeal instead to the intuitive principle that a concatenation can only
be said to be running when at least one of its factors is running. But
at the states in question one action is terminating and its successor is
starting. Since the concatenate is not running then, these states shouldnt
be counted as intermediate for the concatenation.
The entire semantic account of an action type, say r, is the specification of its ice-cream cone given the selection of any alternative social
5 The technical reason is that only by casting out these states will the virtual action skip,
mentioned in the next section, serve as what the algebraists term an identity. This identity, along
with the fact that the operation of concatenation is associative, endows the set of actions with an
interesting algebraic structure.
332
Figure 13.4: An Non-Terminating Action
state as a starting state. But why you will want to know should an
action type even have a cone for every social state? Indeed that would
make action types rather more abstract than we would like. We must
thus allow cases in which a given starting point does not have a cone, or
at least one of the usual sort.
13.5.1
When good actions go badly
The standard pathology of actions is confined to those which do not terminate. These are actions with no ice-cream so-to-speak and thats their
graphic representation. And if actions are conceived as the bringings
about (of the truth or falsehood of propositions for instance), then these
are the only actions which fail.
But in our account of action types there is the cone to consider as
well. In this case there is clearly the possibility of another form of
misfire.. It might be that the action in question cannot even be started.
13.5. ACTIONS
333
Figure 13.5: A Non-Starting Action
Such an action has no cone at all, and is represented graphically by a

backwards facing cone.6
An important property of actions which is studied in Track but not
elsewhere in the literature (at least in the literature on formal accounts of
action) is that one action may block another.7 The basic idea is simple
enough: the action r1 might BLOCK the action r2 in one of two ways.
In the first way, attempting to perform r2 after performing r1 (which is
to say graphically at any point in the ice-cream portion of r1 ) either will
not terminate or will not start. In the second way, attempting to perform
6 This raises the issue of whether or not an action with no cone might nevertheless have some
ice-cream. Such a thing sounds bizarre and in Track such actions are called virtual. In point of fact
the literature contains at least one such action called (in Track and elsewhere) skip. This action
always terminates in the unit set of the state in which it was started and traverses no intermediate
states in its journey. To put the matter whimsically, skip has always and everywhere just finished
being performed although nowhere is the performance of it actually taking place.
7 This idea appeared in the early stages of research which was later reported in Track, and at
first seemed nothing more than a minor curiosity. As we began to exercise the Track account of
rules however, it soon became clear that blocking is a central and crucial notion.
334
r2 while at the same time performing r1 , which is to say graphically in

the cone portion of r1 , does not terminate or does not start.8
13.6
Rules
Which brings us to the center of Track and to the notion that must bear
a great deal of the weight when morals meet sciencethe theory of
rules.
The theory as presented in Track might be termed forbidding in
more than one sense, alas. In the first sense, the introduction of the idea
of actions blocking one another allowed a simplification of the theory
in that all rules can be cast into the form of rules of forbidding. An
earlier effort9 had already reduced all rules to those in the top row of the
square of oppositionforbidding and permitting. But with blocking in
our arsenal, we can parse rules which permit the action r as rules which
forbid all those actions r which block r.
Unhappily the theory also seems have been forbidding in that it presumed too much in the way of formal science to be easily digestible by
its target audience.
Given our current graphical turn however, we can see what a rule is,
at a glance. Consider figure 13.6.
Here we see the universe of alternative social states from the perspective of a particular subset of them, those which satisfy the condition
C, of a certain collection of rules Fi . These are the states, the C-states,
where the rules apply. We refer to actions that start in C as C-state actions. What each Fi does, in simplest terms, is to forbid certain C-state
actions (to a certain class of agents, those within the so-called demographic scope of Fi . To avoid complicating the exposition, we typically
suppress mention of these agents).
8 The illustration of these two in Track is in terms of tying shoe laces. You can block my tying
my shoe laces by untying whichever lace I have just tied. So long as you perform your untying
action, my tying action cannot terminate. This is an example of the second way of blocking.
Alternatively you might make away with my shoes while I take a reckless nap, which will ensure
that my tying action cannot start.
9 By Charles Hamblin, see ?
13.6. RULES
335
The set of states which satisfy the condition C
Figure 13.6: Instantaneous Picture of a Rule
The darkened areas of the social universe, represent the forbidden

actions according to the collection Fi in that the only way to reach any
darkened state is by means of an action which some Fi rule forbids. Ah
you say, but what if the actual social state, our current state lies in one
of the dark zones? (see figure 13.7) Well, that would be a bad thing
so bad indeed, that we have a name for ita quandary. Quandaries are
to rules what contradictions are to propositions.10
It must be emphasized here that figure 13.6 is not a picture or diagram of the effect of a set of rulesit is instead a snapshot of the actions
forbidden by the rules relative to a certain condition and a certain collection of agents. One might postulate the existence of certain rules that
hold for all agents under all conditionsbut this is no part of the Track
doctrine.
10 In practical terms, one would be as bad off as somebody in a quandary if ones social state
were entirely surrounded by a dark zone as a single candle burning in the darkness. In such a
situation there is only one action not forbidden, but it is the virtual one skip.
336
Current Social State
Figure 13.7: A Quandary Situation
As we trace out a certain trajectory in the social space which is to

say, move from one social alternative to another, we also pass from one
condition to another. As this happen the class of forbidden actions and,
it goes without saying, the class of agents bound by the rules, change.
So a picture like figure 13.6 is really only one frame in a movieand it
is the movie which is the true representation of the rule.
13.7
Utilitarianism
For much of his philosophical career David Braybrooke has been interested in utilitarianism. Given his interest in rules, we can see at least
one reason for such an interest. To put the matter in the whimsical idiom
of the previous section, one wants to know whether or not the movie has
a happy ending.
The thing is, a given society of individual agents who are bound by
a sequence of rules (which come into effect as they progress from one
13.7. UTILITARIANISM
337
alternative state to another) will, since portions of the state space are
forbidden by the rules, tend to move to the other states, the ones which
are not forbidden. At least this will happen if sufficiently many people
who are bound by the rules, actually comply with them.
Waiving that (interesting) consideration for a moment, suppose that
the society in question follows the rules as they evolve from one frame
of the movie to the next. The question is: what should happen? Or
better: If the rules are properly constructed, what should happen? To
put a moral slant on things: what would be a good outcome to following
the rules?
This is a bit tricky but only only a bit and only because we arent yet
equipped with the concepts we require in order to adjudicate the matter.
The first thing we need is the notion of a goal . In this context a goal is a
subset of the space of social alternatives. Which subset? Evidently, one
in which we would like to live, one in which we want the actual social
state to be. We shall shortly take up the issue of how we decide on our
goal, but first we may need to be convinced that such a notion actually
has a role to play.
It should be clear that the function of rules is to restrict which alternative social states are accessible, which is to say that following the
rules amounts to staying within a certain corridor. But what if that corridor doesnt lead anywhere? What if following a certain set of rules
meant only that any alternative social state was as likely as any other as
our destination (subject only to the laws of nature)? To put the question
more bluntly, what incentive would we have to actually bind ourselves
to following such rules?
There has been and remains an intuition on which it may turn out that
following a rule is less advantageous in the short-run than not following
it, but even so, following is the right thing to do. An extreme version
of this view has it that some rules are just correct, pure and simple.
Following them is always the right thing to do and not following them
never is. It would seem then such folk as these would answer the blunt
question that our incentive for following rules can never be more or less
than the rightness of doing so.
At this point we might ask for a list of the right-making properties
338
and a great controversy will ensue. Instead, we shall take the position
that even if the journey be worth more than the destination, the latter has
to count for something. In particular, there must actually be a destination
as opposed to a random walk through social space. This separates us
from the extremists just canvassed. We may think of the region into
which a set or rules leads us, as the goal of, or relative to, that set of
rules.
It also brings us closer to something resembling utilitarianism. Once
we restrict our attention to those collections of rules which have what we
called a goal,11 there remains the question of how to adjudicate between
rival collections. Evidently we can raise the question of whether one
goal is preferable to another and as soon as we do that, we have become
some flavor of utilitarian. Strictly speaking there is a whole range of
alternatives here only some of which are really utilitarian. What we
require is some evaluation of the alternative social states which is to say
a preference ordering.12 How utilitarian we are depends upon how this
preference ordering is used.
I think David Braybrookes contributions to this part of the account
are numerous. One which we might highlight first is the notion that the
goal, whatever subset it eventually turns out to be, has a kind of core.
In other words in order to belong to the goal set of social alternatives,
there is some list of minimal conditions which, while it may not, indeed
probably doesnt, fully characterize the goal, yet gives us a starting point
for calculating which states are likely candidates. Perhaps we can say
that although we may not be in a position to identify the goal with much
precision, we are prepared to say immediately that social states of suchand-such a kind will definitely not belong.
I look at Braybrookes work on needs as being of this sort. Whatever other properties a state satisfying a (social) goal might turn out to
have, within the goal the needs of the individual members of society
will be met according to some well-defined standard of provision. In
11 There is another technical matter concerning goals. A goal should be not only a subset of the
state space which we eventually reach, but a subset which once entered, we do not subsequently
leaveat least not without a change in the rules.
12 Utilitarians, of the later generations at least, came to regard preference which a jaundiced
eye. They it were who coined Better Socrates unsatisfied than a pig satisfied.
13.8. WHERES THE POLITICS?
339
fact the book on needs makes a useful beginning as a specification of

such standards and indeed spelling out just what sort of thing is a need,
and telling us why the concept of needs and paying attention to them can
be seen as central to what we (but not Braybrooke) have been calling a
social goal.
13.8 Wheres the politics?

Even if we can agree on the core properties of the goal states, it might
well be necessary to go beyond those properties to specify an additional
collection of features. In particular, there may be political-economic
reasons for such a thing.
Think of it this way: We describe a subset of the space of social alternatives in which we shall (eventually) arrive provided enough members
of society act in accord with the rules in a certain collection. We can
see, in the abstract perhaps that the rules should be such as to secure the
provision of needs, but will that be enough? Enough, that is, to ensure
the amount of compliance required to reach the destination subset. It
might failhuman nature being what it is.
In order to ensure a sufficient level of compliance we must then take
further measures. Moral education of a more or less strenuous sort has
been popular in this regard (one might think of the so-called cultural
revolution in China as an example) though not always efficient. Beyond
the softer measures are rank upon rank of harsher, and more expensive
methods. After a certain point, the game is no longer worth the candle
once the Gulags and the Dzerzhinsky squares appear, for instance.
In such a case we must find another way to convince (sufficiently
many) members of society to follow the rules. And what other way is
there, when coercive measures have been put aside13 , but to appeal to
the preferences of sufficiently many? Evidently what has to be done is
to further shape the goal (which will also require tuning up the collection of rules).
But havent we now set ourselves an impossible task? After all K.J.
Arrow has shown that blah blah blah and we all know what that means.
13 not
that they are ever entirely put aside
340
Individual preference orderings cannot be aggregated in any convincing

way. Or does it?
I am inclined to think that we have been coming at the problem the
wrong way around. In the first place we cannot (or at least should not)
prove that social choice is impossible since it happens all the time.
Instead of first trying to define the social preference ordering , and then
choosing alternative states on the basis of that ordering, we should ask
how we might go about choosing the states. We can then see what social
preference ordering (if any) is implied by this choice, and let the chips
fall where they may.
So how do we actually decide on social policy? How do we decide
which kinds of alternative social states to aim for? It is a complicated,
but not entirely impenetrable matter. Let us idealize it a bit but not to
an absurd degree. And once more we can call upon the vision of David
Braybrooke who has emphasized issues and made interesting conjectures concerning how issues are processed in a social setting.
The basic idea in our idealization, is that of an agenda which is
a collection of issues, each of which is represented by a proposition
(which is part of the idealization). The propositions are considered in
turn by a number of parties either all the individuals in the society or,
more usually, their representatives. These representatives consult their
own preferences in order to judge whether or not any given proposition
in the agenda is preferred to its negation.
This is another tricky technical matter since we have hypothesized
only the preference orderings defined over states and we have now to
parlay that into an ordering defined for sets of states (which is what,
semantically speaking, propositions are). Suffice it to say that such a
type-raising is indeed possible.14 So each member can decide for
herself whether she would prefer that the proposition P , for instance, be
true rather than false or vice versa or finally whether she is indifferent
between the two.15
14 this
matter is treated in more detail in ?.
15 An advantage to considering propositionssets of states as opposed to individual alternative
social states is that a number of different individuals can have wildly varying preference orderings
on the states and yet have wide agreement on the orderings of sets. This fact makes it more
plausible that a relatively small number of representatives can accurately reflect the preferences of
13.8. WHERES THE POLITICS?
341
If we were to presume, which we assuredly do not, that all the decision makers have perfect information, then we could allow an agenda to
contain every proposition. But that would be an idealization extending
into what we called the absurd.
In our picture, a group of adjudicators, decision makers, or the representatives of the interested parties (who are themselves, we presume
also interested parties) confront the list of propositions (issues) on a
given agenda. Some of the propositions might well be agreed to by everyone (or their negations agreed to) and those will go on to form part of
the goal, pending agreement on the package. Many, it may be presumed
will be preferred by some but not by others. Here there is the possibility
of so-called log-rolling. You care nothing for P one way or the other but
are committed to Q while for me the two attitudes are reversed. There
is the material for a bargain here. Further bargains might result from
my weak preference for P retiring in the face of your strong preference
for not-P , so long as my strong preference for Q similarly trumps your
relatively weaker preference for its negation.
Eventually we get as far as we can go. What are left are the issues
concerning which we can not secure agreement. Some of us prefer P
as a matter of deeply held principles while the others prefer not-P on a
similar basis.
Various means have evolved to produce a decision in these cases
too but we shouldnt ignore the possibility of simply dropping the more
contentious issues from the agenda. If the value of the bargain consisting of the package of issues already agreed to is sufficiently high,
then there is that much incentive to find a way to complete the bargain.
When strongly held principles stand in the way of a valuable bargain,
we dont discard the principles (for the most part) but that need not prevent us from discarding the occasion on which the principles become
inconvenient.
An added incentive to pull back from a game of duelling principles
is that this whole procedure, from agenda formation to final decision, is
one that is going to take place again and again. If our principles clash
today, whos to say that tomorrow you wont be converted to my point of
quite a large constituency.
342
view, or I to yours. This highlights another of David Braybrookes key

insightsthe value of an incremental approach to policy formation.
If we allow the goal to be formed by a sequence of processes like the
one just described, then it will be a moving target, although there must
be some limit on the velocity of its movement or the process wont work.
If all of our preference orderings changed wildly every day, then given
the cost of computing (a stage of) the goal and of setting up a set of
rules which conduce to that goal, it would be too expensive to attempt.
But, in real life, our preferences do not change wildly and the idea of
forming a goal in these stages while at the same time reconstructing the
collection of rules so that its goal matches the one we are computing,
seems if not a clear match to some actual procedure, then at least an
interesting idealization.
It seems that in the new science of issue processing coupled with
this new account of rules, we have come at last to something like the
foundations of policy analysis.
Chapter 14
Bootstrapping Norms: From

Cause to Intention
B RYSON B ROWN
Abstract
In Logic on the Track of Social Change, David Braybrooke, Peter Schotch,
and I developed a theory of rules, including both a definition of rules and
a logic explicitly designed to enable us to express their contents in an illuminating way. This paper sketches an account of the relation between
the normative and the descriptive elements of that theory. The account
draws on a bootstrap argument due to Sellars, who used it to ground an
account of how an agent can come to be aware, and justified in asserting,
that she is a reliable observer. Sellarss argument relies on a distinction
between descriptive assertions about episodes and their normative interpretation. This paper relies on the same distinction to explain how an
agent can come to be aware, and justified in asserting, that she is normatively engaged with a system of rules.
14.1 Introduction
In Logic on the Track of Social Change (1995; hereafter Track), Braybrooke, Brown, and Schotch present a definition of rules that includes
both causal and intentional elements. Our definition appeals to a technical notion of imperatives, which we identify as blocking operations.
Blocking operations must be causally efficaciousthat is, they must
343
344
CHAPTER 14. BRYSON BROWN
actually (in some relevant and substantial range of cases) prevent actions of a certain type on the part of some agent(s). But they must also
be intended to have this effect. A rule is identified with the class of
imperatives (whether actual or merely possible) targeting the actions
forbidden by the rule.
How this blocking is accomplished varies with the blocking operation employedwith young children, direct physical intervention (for
instance, holding on to a child to prevent her running out into the street)
is fairly common. Even with adults, this form of blocking may be used,
for instance, when trying to correct a flaw in how an athlete performs a
swimming stroke, a dance step, or a gymnastic move. But saying dont
or no or stop can also be blocking actions, since some agents in some
circumstances respond to these utterances (on the part of certain other
agents) by not doing something they would otherwise have done. And
of course there are many more examples. In all these cases, however,
the action qualifies as a blocking action if and only if it is both of a kind
which, with a fair degree of regularity, causally prevents agents from
doing actions of the targeted type, and is intended to have that effect.
Our principal aim in Track was to develop and apply a rich, formally structured account of rules. The resulting account, linking rules
and causal relations without reducing the first to the second, links two
distinctive approaches to the social sciences. An emphasis on the importance of rules is characteristic of what Braybrooke calls interpretive
social science.1 But a focus on regular correlations and causal hypotheses invoked to explain them is characteristic of what he calls the naturalistic approach. Drawing on both, we proposed an approach to rules
that integrates the descriptive evidence of regular correlation and causal
analysis while allowing an important role for intentions as well.
However, in Track we left the relation between these causal and intentional elements unexplored. In this paper, I examine both sides of
our proposed definition and sketch a bootstrap argument that tries to
1 For more on these two approaches to social science, as well as a third (the critical), see
Braybrooke (1987b), chap. 1). Braybrookes case for a more ecumenical view of these approaches
to social science (as contrasted with the widespread view that they are mutually exclusive) is an
important inspiration for this papers efforts to understand the relations between the natural and
the normative.
14.1. INTRODUCTION
345
account for how causal interactions underlie but do not constitute the
intentional/normative component of rules. A striking epistemological
argument due to Wilfrid Sellars is the main inspiration for both the
account I will give of the distinction between these elements and the
account I offer of how the intentional, normative dimension arises from
the natural causal order.2 For reasons of space and time, I will not attempt a detailed reading of Sellarss argument. My aim at this stage
of the work is only to indicate how some aspects of Sellarss views,
especially the possibility of retroactively assigning a normative status
to past events,3 contribute to a promising understanding of the roots of
normativity. I believe the resulting account, though only an outline at
this point, has a virtue characteristic of Sellarss approach to many issues: It is conceptually rich, but also metaphysically economical (even
austere).
There are two entangled but distinct purposes for which we might
use an account of social rules. They correspond to two very different
sorts of explanations that we can give of human behaviours. For the
purposes of naturalistic explanation, human behaviour is just part of
the natural goings-on in the world around us. Like other cases of related
phenomena that constitute what Dudley Shapere (Shapere (1982)) has
called domains, behaviour is distinguished from other phenomena by a
commitment we have made to treat it as calling for an explanation in
terms of a common set of principles.4 Broadly, behaviour is distinguished from other kinds of goings-on by the different regularities and
principles we invoke to predict and explain it. But the regularities and
principles at work in such behavioural studies are not different in kind
2 For Sellarss distinction between the natural and the logical order see, e.g., Being and Being Known and Some Reflections on Language Games. Sellars (1960, 1954) The bootstrap
argument presented here is modelled on Sellarss well-known bootstrap defence of an empiricist/inductivist account of perceptual knowledge in Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind.
3 Something that is only possible because such assignments are interpretive rather than descriptive.
4 See Sellarss remarks on behaviourism in Philosophy and the Scientific Image of
Man,(Sellars (1962)) and in Science, Perception and Reality (Sellars (1963)) (hereafter Science),
23ff., where behaviour is distinguished from other phenomena involving living things. Sellarss
discussion of worm behaviouristics, together with the distinction between nature and character in
the prediction/explanation of human behaviour (see Science, 13ff.), reflects an interesting perspective on the contextual constraints that circumscribe our use of certain explanatory principles.
346
from the regularities and principles applying to (for instance) what water does when cooled to 0 Celsius, or once heated (at standard pressure)
to 100 Celsius as net heat is removed or supplied, respectively. They
are commitments regarding how we shall project from what we observe
of people and their doings to a fuller, but still purely descriptive, story
of people in the world.
Its worth noting that these behavioural principles are limited to
contexts in which something like standard conditions hold for the organisms involved; further, not just anything that humans or other organisms do is grist for the mill of behavioural science. We learn to draw
distinctions at mothers knee, recognizing circumstances and kinds of
goings-on that are part of behaviour as separate from other aspects of
the nature of things. Its worth noting that these distinctions are rich
and complex in ways we dont often notice.5 But the point I want to
make here is just that social science in this vein is an entirely naturalistic affair. It treats us as part and parcel of the natural world, subject
to the same kind of scientific description and explanation as any other
aspect of that world. This explicitly monist approach has a substantial
prima facie edge over dualism, both of conceptual economy and coherence: Dualism (at least when taken at its metaphysical face value) posits
mysterious, non-physical aspects of reality that are declared to be importantly connected both to the natural world and to a separate realm of
norms. Deep and troubling puzzles have arisen in philosophers efforts
to explain how a mere addition (however exotic) to descriptive reality can bridge the gap between descriptions and norms. But however
these questions are to be resolved, they are no concern of naturalistic
social science. The aim of that endeavour is to capture and explain behavioural regularities. The normative interpretation of behaviour plays
no role there.
5 For our purposes, not much hangs on exactly where we draw the line between what is
and is not behaviour. What we would normally describe as deliberate actions certainly count as
behaviour; so are typical responses to sensory stimuli (shutting or covering the eyes when suddenly
exposed to a very bright light, pulling ones hand off after touching a hot surface, etc.). But falling
to the ground when thrown out a window does not (though a lot of behaviour would probably occur
along the way): this is something that happens because of features we share with all heavier-thanair physical objects, while behaviour turns on certain kinds of features that we share (broadly) with
living things.
14.1. INTRODUCTION
347
On the other hand, when our aim is interpretive, we want to embed

what people are and do in a normative framework. Interpretive social
science takes behaviour to be goal-directed and norm-guided. Such efforts, I will suggest, are analogous to translation: they connect our own
understanding of norms in general and of familiar systems of norms in
particular with the doings we have observed, regularizing them in the
rich sense of fitting them into a normative framework.6 The result, if we
are successful, is an understanding of their behaviour cast in the kinds
of terms we use to explain and justify our own behaviour: meaningful,
purposive, and at least sometimes rule-guided. Success in these efforts
allows us to say, Yes, we see why they do these things; they do things
that, were we situated as they are, with their beliefs and commitments,
we ourselves would (or should) do.
Sellarss views on meaning are in the background here. For Sellars,
. . . means expresses a translation-relation, in which (normally) is expressed in a language the speaker and audience share
(and at the very least, in a language the audience understands) and the
role of . . . , in the language being translated, is identified with the role
of in the familiar language (1956, 163) These roles, in turn, are
specified in terms of the norms of use for . . . and in their respective languages, including norms of inference in the language (and
the difference that . . . makes to the inferences that are endorsed by
them) and the links between language use and circumstance that are
involved in observation (what Sellars called language entry) and deliberate action (language exit). So what Im suggesting is that a similar,
translational effort to map behaviour into normative systems (whether
normative systems we are actually committed to or systems described
with the help of a meta-language of norms) underlies interpretive social
science.
6 Here Davidsonian remarks regarding charity and the presupposition of rationality come in
although in our presentation, they arise explicitly as part of the methodological task of connecting
hypotheses about rules in force with observations of behaviour, rather than as presuppositions of
interpretation.
348
14.2
Rules in Logic on the Track of Social Change
In Track we specified the content of a rule in terms of three components: volk is the set of agents to whom the rule applies, wenn is the
set of circumstances in which the rule applies, and nono is the set of
actions forbidden (to those agents in those circumstances) by the rule.
But our definition of rules begins with a technical notion labelled (for
obvious reasons) imperatives. An imperative, in our sense, is a blocking operation, verbal or otherwise. A blocking operation, in turn, is an
action kind whose instances characteristically (in some important range
of circumstances) prevent some agent(s) from performing an action(s)
of a certain kind, and which is performed with that intent(34). Blocking
operations need not always succeed; a blocking operation qualifies for
the title if it works sometimes for some people . . . when conditions are
suited to its succeeding (34; emphasis added). A rule, in the abstract, is
a set of such imperativesthat is, a set of blocking actions, directed at
the volk, under the wenn, and against the nono. Finally, a rule in force
is a rule sufficiently many7 of whose imperatives actually occur.
This definition appeals to natural facts, but it combines them with
normative/intentional facts. The range of possible blocking operations
is determined by the natural causal influences that some available action
types have, in various circumstances, on the actions of certain agents.
But they are not blocking operations just in virtue of these natural causal
powers. To be a blocking operation, what someone does must be done
with the intention or purpose of preventing someone from doing something.
This picture of rules leads us to the final image of a triptych, three
panels representing different stages in the application of a rule for a
given subject: In the first panel, the subject is exposed to a range of
imperatives aimed at ensuring that her behaviour accords with the rule.
In the second panel, subjects in whom the rule has been successfully inculcated govern themselves: They now possess an internal system that
(often enough, under what we might call normal psychological oper7
Sufficiently many, that is, for the purposes of instruction and enforcement.
14.2. RULES IN LOGIC ON THE TRACK OF SOCIAL CHANGE
349
ating conditions)8 prevents them from violating the rule. It may do so

by producing internal imperatives blocking such actions when the wenn
condition of the rule is met,9 or by replacing or altering the original
system for generating actions in some way that has the effect of ensuring general compliance with the rule. These mechanisms either involve
conscious obedience to the rule or lie in a middle ground10 between
consciously obeying a rule and merely conforming to it.11 In the third
and final panel, rules that early training does not suffice to inculcate (to
a sufficient degree, in a sufficient number of subjects) are enforced by
(a wide range of) penalties directed against violations.
There is obviously a lot more to be said here. To forestall one misunderstanding (arising from the assumption that our account of imperative
aims to be an account of the familiar grammatical notion), I will point
out that our use of the word imperative is technical: Its application
to these action kinds is inspired by the ordinary understanding of the
imperative voice as directing or giving ordersbut some uses of that
voice are not imperatives in our sense (consider ironic and other nonstandard uses of the imperative voice) and many other things (gestures,
expletives, merely declarative sentences uttered in certain ways and in
certain circumstances, and a broad range of actions like closing a door
or turning away from someone) are imperatives in our sense.
A second concern is the problem of deciding which, and how many,
imperatives must occur for a rule to be in force. It depends on the kind
of imperatives that occur, on the range of relevant rule alternatives that
the imperatives must bring us to distinguish between, and the kinds of
cues that enable those subject to the rules to learn them. Here we rely on
a rich background of natural facts about developmental and behavioural
8
It is clear that there is a normative side to this notionbut we will not try to untangle it from
its descriptive aspects yet.
9 This is reminiscent of Humes remarks on abstract ideas, according to which the idea of the
counterexample to a mistaken generalization is called to mind automatically when we contemplate
the generalization; the result is that acceptance of the generalization is blocked by our awareness
of the counterexample.
10 Sellars identifies this middle ground in Some Reflections, in Science, 321-58.
11 In this middle ground, though it is false that we are consciously following the rules, the
subjects behaviour is still correctly interpreted in terms of the rule: The subject does as she does
because the rule is in place, even though she does not explicitly represent the rule to herself in a
meta-language and constrain her behaviour by means of that representation.
350
psychology. Given that background, it may turn out that certain types
of imperatives are particularly effective in driving the transition from
panel 1 in our triptych view of rules in force, where imperatives arise in
the course of training, to panel 2, in which the rules have been successfully inculcated in someone subject to them. Further, some rules are so
naturally and thoroughly inculcated (and any violations that persist of
little enough concern) that panel 3 plays almost no role in keeping violations down. On the other hand, others obviously require systematic
and expensive enforcement efforts.
14.3
Some Worries
Epistemically this is tricky business. After all, a settled or established

matter-of-fact violation of a principle of descriptive science is a refutation of that principle: Although a refuted principle might still apply
usefully in a special subset of cases, it can no longer be defended as a
fundamental principle. But an established, matter-of-fact violation of a
norm does not show that the norm itself isnt in force or didnt apply to
the action violating it. Further, the fact that establishing that there has
been a violation of a (proposed) natural principle falsifies that principle
is widely, and rightly, viewed as a critically important source of the epistemic standing our commitments to such principles do have: A principle
that cannot be tested in this way cannot be confirmed or vindicated by
passing such tests either.
Even with such tests in hand, the epistemology of natural laws is
challenging enough. They reach far beyond the goings-on that we have
actually observed; their acceptance commits us to claims about events
we did not and may never observe. Further, such commitments are usually thought to commit us to counterfactuals, constraining things or circumstances that never actually occur. But, at least for an empiricist,
the evidence we draw on to justify such commitments is limited to the
observations we have actually made. Humes concerns about induction loom large here. Our evidence often seems far too thin to justify
a serious cognitive commitment to general principles of nature. These
considerations raise even deeper doubts about the epistemology of rules
14.3. SOME WORRIES
351
and norms, which seem to be more tenuously linked to actual observation.

Suppose for now that we know what we are claiming when we assert
that a certain rule is in force, and invoke that rules being in force to
explain some actions performed by certain agents. (Recall that our account in Track emphasizes the regular appearance of imperatives aimed
at inculcating and enforcing compliance.) Two questions come immediately to mind:
1. How can we justify the choice of which rules to invoke, when
social scientists pursue interpretive social science? (The problem
is that there is always a wide range of alternative rules that would
fit the observed behaviour equally well, i.e. which the behaviour
conforms to.)
2. How does a rules being in force explain features of the actions
the rule applies to?
In Track, we are fairly lax about these concerns. Our position there
is that it suffices for holding that people know what the rules are to
find them distinguishing behaviour that accords with the rules from behaviour that does not. It suffices for holding that they are following
the rules to find them either acting so as to avoid blocking, physical
or verbal, or modifying their course of action suitably when a form of
blocking is produced (or begun) by way of caution (39). And for the
purposes in view there, this is reasonably satisfying. We clearly have
a successful practice in which we both identify certain rules that some
people are following, and interpret behaviour, our own and others, by
appeal to various goals and rules. Appealing to that practice is fair ball.
But it does not illuminate what justifies our applying such concepts at
all. Neither does it help to explain how we acquire them. As an account of our grounds for distinguishing merely natural description and
explanation from the normative, and choosing, as we do, to apply the
normative to a wide range of human (and perhaps some non-human)
behaviour, it doesnt go far enough. So here we will spend a little more
time dwelling on the difficulties.
352
A convincing general answer to question 1 will be difficult to come

by. As Goodman showed long ago (Goodman (1965)), different ways
of reporting our evidence to date regarding the colour of emeralds seem
to be equally correct as descriptions of the evidence, while suggesting
very different inductive conclusions regarding the colour of emeralds
observed in the future. But this problem is clearly a problem for both
natural laws and norms, and so not specifically a problem for norms.12
The first step towards an answer to question 2 is to say that it is not
by the same means as natural principles explain regularities in our observations. In the case of natural laws, we have a direct inference from
their holding to the regularities that the laws logically impose on the
phenomena (this is just the converse of the falsificationists inference).
In standard cases a rules being in force explains why some actions
comply with it, but not by appeal to a direct inference from the rules
being in force to the actions complying with it. Natural things obey the
laws of gravitywhatever these actually arewith no need of thought
or calculation. But (in the central cases that extended or even metaphorical cases are modelled on) agents obey rules in virtue of consciously
recognizing that those rules apply to their action(s), and deliberately
conforming their actions to the requirements of the rules. Full-fledged
obedience to a rule combines awareness of the rules demands, a conscious commitment to respect them, and the ability to fulfill that commitment. Accidentally conforming to a rules demands lies at the other
extremehere the rule plays no explanatory role at all. In between, we
find pattern-governed behaviour, which accords with the rule not merely
by accident, but for reasons that link the volk, wenn, and nono components together in a reliable way, ensuring that the subject will generally
respond to circumstances in which he falls within volk and wenn of the
12 I do not mean this as the counsel of despair. Goodmans puzzle passes over the role that
material inference rules (Some Reflections, in Science, 352ff.) play in making the predicates of
our language the predicates that they are. This approach makes induction a fundamental part of
what we are committed to in speaking a language. Of course this does not show that the world must
behave as induction leads us to expect. But it does undermine the simple equivalence Goodmans
argument assumes between grue and observed before t and green or observed after t and blue.
The inductive practice Goodman envisages as associated with grue is clearly distinct from that
associated with the language of this proposed definition.
14.4. THE BOOTSTRAP ARGUMENT
353
rule by avoiding actions in the nono.13

There are slips between the inferential cup and lip for rule explanations, unlike explanations in terms of natural principles. Failures to
obey a rule in force can be due to ignorance (whether culpable or not),
to calculational errors and limits (especially in complex cases),14 and
even to willful disobedience: a rules being in force may even explain,
by means of awareness of the rules being in force combined with a
deliberate response to that fact, actions that dont comply with it (we
often call such actions defiant or rebellious). These aspects are part of
what makes rule explanations normativeand their impact weakens the
epistemic ties between observed regularities and tests of rule hypotheses. But there is a positive side to these differences as well, picked up
in both panels 1 and 3 of our triptych: justifying rule hypotheses also
requires evidence of background conditions eliciting and enforcing obedience to the rules. That is, rules are accompanied by efforts to instruct
and enforce ruleswhich appear at the descriptive level as blocking
actions (in the causal sense), and characteristic patterns of response to
violations of the rules.
14.4
The Bootstrap Argument
Thus far this discussion has focused on the relation between hypotheses regarding rules in force and descriptive facts about the behaviour of
those subject to them. But the specifically normative aspects of such
hypotheses about rules relate not just to direct behavioural evidence
and how it fits the hypothesized rules, but to interpretive commitments
regarding how we will construe (some aspects of some peoples) behaviour. These commitments can be vindicated by successful application, which involves not merely examples of behaviour conforming
13 See Some Reflections for more details. Crucial to Sellarss account of rule-governed
behaviour is the identification of a middle ground between this strong sense of obedience and
mere conformity to a rules demands. According to Sellars, behaviour can be guided by a rule
without the subjects having to represent the rule in some meta-language. This middle ground
allows Sellars to escape a regress that threatens the thesis that learning a language is learning to
obey the rules of that language.
14 Closely related to this is the injunction to legislators that laws must be such that it is clear to
anyone aware of a laws provisions whether what they are doing violates it.
354
to the rule, but also giving an account of how conformity to the rule is
elicited and enforced. The evidence in hand goes beyond whether or not
certain behaviour violates the rules to include an examination of the behaviour in its social context, including efforts at teaching, inculcation,
and enforcement of the rules.
We will not begin with rules explicitly formulated in words. Focusing on this admittedly central case seems to produce an irresolvable
regress: we cannot communicate the contents of such rules to each other
without presupposing a shared system of rules. This leads to an obvious question: How could we communicate the contents of these rules,
so that communication can get underway? Assuming the existence of a
built-in system that we all share ab initio might provide an escape from
this worry, but empiricists will want to avoid simply cutting the Gordian
knot.15
Instead, we will begin with development. The key question will
be: How do individuals make the shift from merely behaving to acting
deliberately, in recognition of rules that apply to them and to others?
Our answer must account for how we acquire concepts including the
concepts of a rule, of authority, and of commitment, and how we come
to be justified in applying these concepts to ourselves.
Along the way I will draw explicitly on Sellarss work to illuminate
these difficulties and point towards a strategy for dealing with them.
Sellars aims to take empiricist scruples about evidence seriously, while
finding room for rationalist ideas about the fundamental importance of
rules and concepts to our understanding of the world and of each other.
This aim is apparent in Sellarss careful examination of the descriptive,
naturalistic underpinnings of his account of how someone can come to
be an observer. In his epistemic bootstrap argument, Sellars explores
how an individual knower can appeal to a kind of induction to justify
her claim to be an authority on certain perceptible aspects of her surroundings. In doing so, she enters into the normative game by meeting
its demands. We begin with an account of Sellarss view of sensations
15 Note that this does not rule out sharing certain matter-of-fact dispositions that make it easier
to train individuals to obey rules of a particular kind. See Some Reflections for a very careful
approach to escaping this regress.
355
and their relation to the philosophical notion of sense data:

It certainly begins to look as though the classical concept
of a sense datum were a mongrel resulting from a crossbreeding of two ideas: (1) The idea that there are certain inner episodese.g. sensations of red or C which can occur
to human beings (and brutes) without any prior process of
learning or concept formation; and without which it would
be impossible to see, for example, that the facing surface of
a physical object is red and triangular, or hear that a certain
physical sound is C . (2) The idea that there are certain inner
episodes which are the non-inferential knowings that certain
items are, for example, red or C ; and that these episodes are
the necessary conditions of empirical knowledge as providing the evidence for all other empirical propositions. (Science, 132)
The division Sellars makes here is between mere sensations as episodes in the natural order and the non-inferential knowings he holds
some have confused them with. For Sellars, knowings are episodes in
the normative order, playing a certain role in the give and take of justification. These episodes presuppose, but are not reducible to, certain facts
about the natural order. In particular, facts we are able to report must
cause (in certain conditions) states in observers that are behaviourally
discriminable, that is, states that (once the observers are trained) can
cause the observers to make certain noises or write certain inscriptions,
noises and inscriptions that they will not make or write when not in
those states.16 These behaviourally discriminable states are what Sellars calls sensations: they are posited natural states of observers that are
16 This condition clearly failed for Ren
e Blondlots N-rays when a visiting scientist put the
N-ray source in his pocket and the unknowing observers went merrily along making more observations of N-ray phenomena. This clever little jape put an end to the study of N-rays. Note
that meeting this condition alone is not enough to constitute a knowing, though it does make the
observer a reliable source of information; an observer trained in this merely stimulus-response
way, no matter how reliable, does not properly know or report anything. On Sellarss account, to
know or report, the observer must not merely be a reliable reportershe must know that she is
reliable. This reflexive, normative condition leads to a regress that Sellars avoids by appeal to the
bootstrap argument we are about to consider.
356
normally triggered by sensory exposure to a particular kind of stimulus. But they can also be triggered by other circumstances as well (thus
explaining, in outline, how perceptual illusions occur).
On Sellarss account, the ability to have sensations is not acquired.17
It constitutes the natural basis that allows us to learn to make perceptual reports. But the ability to perceivethat is, to know certain facts
about our surroundings by means of a non-inferential response to our
sensationsis acquired. Knowing requires more than just reliable noisemaking. Knowledge requires also an awareness of ones own authority
as knower. This in turn requires developing not just the ability to respond reliably to different sensations, but also the concepts and skills
required to produce justifications of the claims we make.
The transition from mere thermometer reliability to having epistemic status as an observer in ones own right requires that one learn
to defend a claim to the authority to make such assertions in such circumstances.18 Suppose that our ability to come to know facts about our
environment by means of our senses is something that we learn. Empiricism requires that the recognition of this ability in oneself be grounded
in a kind of induction: what grounds our claim to authority in a present
report is our demonstrated past reliability as reporters of certain facts
(the redness or triangularity of an object, or that a certain note is C ).
Now consider the first occasion on which one can correctly claim such
authority. It seems that the past episodes we need to draw on for this induction couldnt be cases of knowledge themselves: Ex hypothesi they
occurred before we had the conceptual sophistication and/or a sufficient
body of past experience of our reliability as knowers of such facts in
such circumstances to give an inductive justification of our claim to authority.19 But without past cases of perceptual knowledge to appeal to,
17 Though it arises in the course of normal neuronal/sensory development, and so might reasonably be said to be acquired in a broader sense.
18 My concern here is with the second hurdle of the two Sellars considers. Passing the first hurdle requires only that others be in a position to treat the observer as an authority; being a reliable
thermometerthat is, being disposed to make correct reports under a range of circumstancesis
enough. But the second hurdle requires that the observer be in a position to recognize her own
authority.
19 A theme I am short-changing here is Sellarss holism, according to which having a single
concept (redness, for instance) requires having a more-or-less complete set of concepts including
357
we seem to be stuck: until we have the inductive base in hand, we cannot use induction to justify our claim to authority, and we cannot build
an inductive base of past justified knowledge claims to generalize on
unless we have a justified claim to authority already in hand.
Sellarss solution to this regress is to claim that the status of such
an episode as a knowing is not an occurrent, natural fact about the
episode. Instead, it results from locating it, conceptually, in a normative,
evaluative context. And we can do this after the fact. That is, we can
retroactively recognize a past report as a case of justified perceptual
knowledge even though at the time that the report was made, we lacked
either (or both) a sufficient grasp of the normative business of justifying
our claims or a sufficient inductive base of similar cases in which our
reports proved correct. Thus Sellarss account of our status as perceptual
knowers holds that at a certain point in our development we come to
have both the conceptual sophistication to justify our knowledge claims
(in certain kinds of circumstance) by appeal to inductive evidence of
their reliability, and sufficient experience of our past success, derived
from a retrospective application of these inductive standards, to provide
the inductive evidence required. Then and only then do we meet the
normative standards applying to knowersbut the cases in which we
then recognize ourselves as meeting the standards extend back into the
past, as well as forward into the future.20
What I want to do here is to apply this kind of argument more
broadly, to sketch the origin of normative concepts including standards
of evidence, commitments, and contents. There will be an evolutionary
element in the series of steps I will describe, as well as a prospective,
commitment-based view of the openness of norms to interpretation. Finally, there will be a meta-linguistic element in the account of our talk of
norms (rather than a metaphysical one). The key element that I will borrow from Sellarss bootstrap argument is the possibility of retrospective
concepts of the conditions of observation, and related concepts (of coloured items and of other
colours, for instance). The bootstrap argument may well also be aimed against the broader regress
puzzle that this view of concept acquisition suggests.
20 If this were claimed to be a descriptive change in the facts about these earlier episodes (as a
reductive account would demand), it would require a bizarre and implausible kind of retro-causal
influence by means of which a subsequent state or activity of the knower could causally alter the
facts about his own epistemic past.
358
interpretation: As in Sellarss epistemic bootstrap, we need to pass two

hurdles herethe first demands a justification for interpreting someones behaviour as a case of rule-following. Here I will assume that
evidence of a sufficiently reliable tendency to avoid actions breaking
the rule, grounded in the effective training and enforcement that occupy
panels 1 and 3 of our triptych, is enough. But the second requires that
the rule-follower be capable of justifiably interpreting her behaviour as
rule-guided. This means that she must have acquired both the conceptual sophistication required and good inductive grounds for regarding
herself as meeting the conditions those concepts impose. Here a regress
arises which I take to be parallel to the regress Sellars addresses in his
bootstrap argument, and resolvable by invoking the same contrast between description and interpretation. Unlike description, interpretation
can be retrospective, ascribing after the fact a normative status to an
episode that the episode did not have at the time that it occurred.
14.5
The Roots of Normativity
The proposal I offer here is tentative and sketchy, but I believe that it
is suggestive. I believe that its components make crucial contributions
to a correct understanding of norms. As I present it here, the proposal
has five components, forming a series of steps beginning on the naturalistic side, but arriving finally at an account of the normative. The key
normative concept that I will focus on is the notion of a commitment . I
believe that the other normative concepts we have been considering can
be subsumed under this notion and, more narrowly, under the notion
of a negative commitment, a commitment not to do something meeting a certain description. In particular, I assume here that paradigmatic
rule-governed behaviour is just behaviour that is constrained by a fullfledged, conscious commitment not to do anything forbidden by the rule.
But our story begins with a much weaker, merely behaviour-predicting,
form of commitment.
14.5. THE ROOTS OF NORMATIVITY
14.5.1
359
Evolutionary Advantage
Being able to signal willingness to make and engagement in a commitment has substantial evolutionary advantages. For example, we can
deal with coordination problems including some forms of prisoners
dilemmas by signalling willingness to cooperate with anyone willing
to reciprocatethe signal could of course be such that it only takes
effectthat is, is only to be relied onif a signal indicating reciprocation is received. At its simplest, this kind of signal could simply be
a flag flown at all times, indicating an inclination to cooperate with
anyone else flying a suitable response flag. Suppose we have a subject
who begins the process here by making a friendly nod towards someone
whose cooperation she needs to enlist in food gathering. By working
together, the two can gather more than twice what each could gather
individually. But each will have an opportunity to make off with all the
food as the end of the day approaches. The nod is returned, and the two
go off to gather food. If these nods are sufficiently reliable indicators of
cooperative behaviour, the benefits of relying on them to establish trust
will outweigh the risk of losing all the food to a sneak. Evidently, when
commitment- signals, linguistic and otherwise, are reliable symptoms
of reasonably durable behavioural dispositions, they can be of considerable value to social organisms. Although the effectiveness of such
signals creates opportunities for cheaters to prosper by manipulating or
faking them, enforcement efforts can make cheating risky enough that
the value (and so the use) of the signals can be sustained.
14.5.2
Naturalism
The signals involved here are to be thought of as natural-linguistic signals of commitment; they need only predict behaviour with sufficient
reliability. The reliability of this prediction can in turn be grounded
in the sort of behaviour the naturalistic side of our account of rules
involvesthe inculcation of rules (in the sense of behavioural regularities) by interaction between trainees and teachers using natural blocking operations, together with enforcement if needed.
360
14.5.3
Metalanguage.
Having developed a simple language in which we can give and acknowledge a variety of such commitments, we can go on to develop language
in which we talk about this practice. Words like commitment, rule,
enforcement, and so forth, come into use here, as part of a complex
linguistic response to the various behaviours involving such signals,
others responses to them, and the broader responses (of teachers and
enforcers, in particular) to behaviours that accord with or violate the signals regular accompaniments. In our example, we may hear our subject
and her partner saying that they have an agreement to work together
and share the proceeds; others may be disposed to comment in various
negative ways should our subject abscond with the days proceeds.
14.5.4
The bootstrap
Here we finally begin to approach the realm of norms. The retrospective element of the bootstrap considers past behaviour and interprets it in
terms of newly acquired normative concepts. Normative concepts themselves originate in meta-linguistic reflection on the language in which
we undertake and acknowledge commitments. Like other aspects of
language use, there are complex natural regularities connecting the use
of these words with other aspects of our behaviour.21 Normative words
are regularly connected to a number of other aspects of language use,
including the language of psychological explanation, allowing forgetfulness or inattention to serve as explanations of failures to act on commitments made. These also include the language of excuses, connected
in turn to various conditions which (when brought to the attention of
concerned parties) have the effect of reducing various social signals,
linguistic and otherwise, that serve to enforce the natural practice of
commitment indication and acknowledgment. At this point, reflection
on patterns of behaviour in our object-level use of descriptive language
may also lead us to apply this metalanguage of rules, commitments, and
21 See Sellars, Sellars (1960), especially 50ff. on the relation between such descriptive regularities (linking language use to other features of the world) and the normative order of signification.
361
so on, to it as wellthat is, we may come to conceive language itself in

terms of this proto-normative vocabulary.
It is very difficult, at this point, not to just slide over the edge into
surreptitiously and then explicitly normative accounts of these phenomena. I ask the reader to cling tightly to a purely descriptive, naturalistic
view of what Ive said to this point. What is being described above are,
broadly, systematic links between behaviour and various signals that
the parties involved display and respond to. By carefully insisting on
the distinction between the normative and the descriptive until the last
turn, we can hope to shed some real light on the roots of the normative.
What I suggest is that our cooperative hunter-gatherer crosses over
the edge to full-fledged use of normative concepts when she learns to
apply this meta-language of commitment to herself, justifiably conceiving herself as making commitments and keeping commitments she has
made.22 As in Sellarss epistemic bootstrap argument, she must have
in hand inductive evidence justifying this application of commitmenttalk to herself, that is, evidence of her ability to make and act on commitments in a reliable way, as well as evidence that she can reason
about both her own commitments and those of others reliably.23 Just
as in the epistemic case, this inductive requirement seems to produce
a regress: The past cases she appeals to in her first application of this
meta-language to herself must by definition predate the time at which
she first applies these concepts to herself. But she can apply them
retroactively, recognizing past commitments, and interpreting them,
using her new vocabulary, as commitments. Recognizing subsequent
past behaviour as having regularly fulfilled her (now recognized) commitments demands, and carrying this interpretation through to completion, she applies her use of this vocabulary for rules, commitments, and
22 Without evidence of commitments kept, seeing oneself as making commitments is (at best)
unjustified.
23 In fact this needs some care, since mere reliability is not enough. I will reliably meet the
conditions of a promise to fall to the ground if thrown out a window. But this is evidence that I am
subject to a certain natural principle, not that I can make and meet commitments. Broadly, what
shows that I can make and meet commitments is evidence that, if I have made a commitment, I
will reliably (where this is qualified by considerations about my being aware that the commitment
is in play and that the circumstances are such that it now demands something of me) act in certain
ways that I could not be predicted to act if I had not undertaken the commitment.
362
so forth, reflexively to itself as well as to object-level linguistic practice.

From a purely naturalistic, descriptive point of view, all that she has
done is to extend her natural-linguistic practice. But as a user of this
extended language, she now conceives herself as making commitments,
as distinguishing actions in accord with those commitments from actions violating them, as teaching and enforcing rules, and as pursuing
various goals. By conceiving herself in these ways, employing these
terms, and reasoning about them in the interpretation and evaluation of
her behaviour (and that of others), she demonstrates a grasp of normative concepts grounded in, but not reducible to, natural facts about
agents and communities. The contents of these concepts extend beyond
the merely descriptive natural facts about our subject and her fellows by
virtue of the rich embedding of the associated inferences with the practical goals and activities of her life, goals that extend beyond the very
narrow goals governing the business of description. And in the light of
her and their success vis-à-vis these goals, together with the bootstrap
considerations brought to bear above, she justifiably interprets herself
(and others) in these terms.
This broader self-interpretation in terms of the language of commitments reflects something that I think is implicit in Sellarss original,
epistemic bootstrap argument: a view of oneself, as an observer, making commitments to the reports one makes, commitments that include
an undertaking of the justificatory burden Sellarss bootstrap induction
aims to meet.
14.5.5
Interpretation of self and others
The account of norms proposed here applies to us because we view ourselves (as our use of this kind of language demonstrates) as subject to the
norms (and to the explicit linguistic expressions of norms) that emerge
from our reflective engagement with each other and with actual language use. It is tempting to say, echoing some versions of relativism,
that we make ourselves subject to norms solely by agreeing to speak of
ourselves in normative terms, and that what those norms demand of us
is simply a matter of what our community decides they demand. But to
say this is to ignore the naturalistic, descriptive facts out of which our
363
meta-linguistic talk of norms arises. We cannot state, in advance, what

limits this background imposes on the range of successful practices
there is no conceptual reduction of the normative to the descriptive to
be had. But the stability of our commonsense world-view, and the continuity of its standards of evidence (including, as I argued in Brown
(2003, 2004), a central role for explanatory coherence), give us robust
assurance that we do not, and cannot, simply make things up at will.
Still, the contents of our commitments to such norms are openended. I cannot demonstrate here and now a full grasp of what the
various norms I am committed to demand of me; part and parcel of the
notion of a norm is that its demands vary with circumstance and are
judged not just by me, but by others to whom I make and (at least in
principle) can express my commitments. When I make commitments to
such norms, what I am implicitly committed to includes all the consequences of those commitments. But I cannot, even in principle, work
these consequences through entirely on my own. Others responses to
the commitments I undertake are part of what determines the demands
a norm imposes on me. Ultimately, these implicit commitments are
conceived normatively, in terms of what an ideal agent or community
would take them to be: There is no non-normative ground in which we
can anchor the contents of norms.
One striking example of this arises in science, where our interpretation of what is reported in previous observations (i.e., the inferences we
are prepared to draw from such reports) shifts as our theories change.
Reliable observations of masses, relative velocities, and so on, provided
by classical physicists now sustain (given our present conceptual resources) inferences those physicists would have rejected. Our commitment to these norms and to our fellows demands openness to this kind of
development of the content of our present commitments over time. The
implications of this openness are of great philosophical interest, but we
will not pursue them further here.
Appendix A
AnotherLiterarySide of David
Braybrooke:The Comic
Dialectician
Abstract
In the following little-known but much appreciated piece, David Braybrooke demonstrates his skill as a wit, in a way which his more serious
writing would never allow.
People will not be especially surprised to learn that professors in

chemistry and physics spend the summer working on experiments in
their laboratories. In geology, oceanography, and biology, many of them
are away from the campus doing research in the field. So are many professors in the social sciences and the humanities. Professors of French,
for example, try to spend recess time in France, which would be a useful
thing for them and their students if they just practiced speaking French
there. In fact, they have reading, writing, and research in French libraries to do as well. Summers are the time to do reading of scholarly
material that isnt tied to their classes, the time, too, to get ahead with the
projectsthe books and articles that they cannot concentrate upon writing under the distracting pressures of term-time. Many professors take
their stipulated months vacation during the four-month recess, spending the other three months on researchin many cases, on teaching
These excerpts originally appeared in the Dalhousie Review 65, no. 3 (Fall 1985), under the
title, Appendix B, or A (Summers) Day in the Life of a Professor of Philosophy. They appear
here at the request of the author and by permission of the Dalhousie Review.
365
366
APPENDIX A
as well, because even during the recess, teaching goes on with graduate students and in two consecutive summer sessions for undergraduates. When their research consists of reading and writing, however,
their working time tends to spread out over the whole recess. Whatever
vacation is taken is taken little by little, in an afternoon here, a day off
there.
Among the professors for whom this is true we find a certain professor of philosophy. Lets call him Green. Green is perhaps an exception
in keeping up his writing all through the year, in term-time and out; and
an exception, too, in doing his writing entirely in his office, to which
he repairs every morning, seven days a week, holidays included. Many
other professors, however, put in the same amount of work year by year,
though they work on different patterns. They may, for instance, do their
reading during term-time; when the term has ended, they put in days at a
time at their typewriters. Green does his intensive reading of scholarly
material, except for the reading (rereading) tied to his classes and the
minimum necessary to keep on with his writing, in the summer.
A typical summer day for Green begins at 7:30, after exercises, a
shower and breakfast. Until about 9 oclock, with some short breaks
for household chores, he reads some philosophical workchapters in
a book; an article in a journalrelated in at least a general way to the
topic that he is writing about. If the topic is the relation between mind
and body, he will be reading an intricate discussion in the Journal of
Philosophy of the extent to which computers can perform mental functions that in human beings can be performed only consciously. At 9
oclock or thereabouts, Green goes to his office, sits down at his typewriter and writes or rewrites 3 or 4 pages of a projected book or article.
Now and then, a student will drop in to ask for a bit of advice; in the
summer, he or she is likely to be a graduate student, working on a thesis. Or maybe a colleague, maybe a secretary, will come in to do some
business, about a calendar entry, or a regulation to be reformulated. By
and large, however, Green sticks with his project until he has finished
his daily stint, and the ideas no longer flow freelyuntil sometime between 11:30 and 12.
367
He will then spend half an hour or an hour on his correspondence,

which might on a given day include writing recommendations for colleagues elsewhere or for former students, ordering some books, exchanging comments on current work with a colleague at another university. At 12:30 or thereabouts, Green walks home to have lunch. He
does a little light reading afterwards, then goes back to the department
of philosophy to look through the days mail. Several items may require
immediate attention: A prospective participant in a week-long conference on philosophy and psychology that he is organizing for later in the
summer writes to ask whether room in the program can be found for
him to read two papers; a publisher writes to ask whether he will assess
a manuscript; Green drafts replies to both and leaves them with a secretary for typing. Then, just before 2 oclock, he goes off again to spend
an hour in the library, first looking up some books in the card catalogue,
then tracking them down in the stacks, picking out some to check out
at the circulation desk. Others he puts back after a glance, as not relevant to his work; still others, missing from the shelves, he will have
to ask the library to recall from other borrowers. Leaving the library
at 3 oclock, he might, some days, have a committee meeting to go to,
perhaps one dealing with revisions to the rules of admitting mature students, perhaps one occupied with measures to encourage more faculty
members to apply for research grants from Federal agencies.
A committee meeting might in fact have taken up all the time that has
elapsed since lunch. Today, however, Green has no committee meetings.
So he goes back, to the department to see whether the secretary has finished his letters for signature and to proofread the half-dozen pages that
she has typed since yesterday of an article that he finished last week. At
quarter to 4, he walks home again and settles down for an hour with a
philosophical work on a priori knowledge. He goes for a swim at Sand
then is occupied until 7 or 7:30 with preparing dinner, eating it, and
washing up afterwards. Some evenings he will not be doing any work
at all, not even any serious reading. But typically he will be reading
one or another book from the pile beside his living-room chair; tonight
it is Fernand Braudels The Wheels of Commerce, a history of everyday
practices during the development of capitalism, that occupies him. (He
368
APPENDIX A
will have a chance to draw upon some of the information in this book
next week, in a debate with other philosophers about the power that private property gives some people over others.) An interruption occurs at
8:20: another member of the team with which he is collaborating on a
picture book about 19th Century architecture in Halifax calls to discuss
the current stage of this project. At 9:30, he turns to lighter reading,
though even this may have a bearing on his work. He is currently reading Edmund Wilsons diary for the 1940s, and he takes that up again,
putting it down after a while to look through a book of 20th Century
watercolors. At 10:30 Green is ready for bed; and to bed he goes.
Excerpt from Faculty Council Minutes, 29 September 1983

Professor Y. said that he thought Appendix B, A (Summers) Day in
the Life of a Professor of Philosophy, was undesirable. Its formulation
was objectionable if indeed this was intended as a strategic document.
People had read this and thought it ridiculous as a portrayal of a serious
persons existence. It was a mistake, which worked against the general
impact of the brief. Professor B. said that members of Council would
recall that this passage had originally been included in the brief. It was
now presented as an appendix so that it could easily be dropped. The
Dean called for a straw vote. Professor W. said that he thought it was
important to indicate that work did go on in the summer. Professor D.
said she was in favour of removal. Aside from the frivolity, the appendix
suggested that Professors had no family or domestic concerns. Professor
F. said that he remembered saying at an earlier meeting that this section
was the part that he had enjoyed most. If it were removed, he hoped
that a suitable footnote might yet take its place. The Dean called for a
motion to deal with the matter. It was moved by Professor L., seconded
by Professor T.,
that Faculty Council recommend to Faculty that Appendices
B and C be omitted from the Faculty Brief to the Royal Commission on Post Secondary Education.
Professor W. asked what was the objection to having something
about what Professors do in the summer. He did not see the harm in
EXCERPT FROM FACULTY MINUTES, 11 OCTOBER 1983
369
addressing these questions seriously. The Dean said that was the committees view. Professor B. said there were no paragraphs in the brief
itself which bore on this question.
The motion was carried with one dissenting vote and three abstentions.
Excerpt from Faculty Minutes, 11 October 1983

The Secretary said that the report had been discussed on two occasions by Faculty Council and as a result there was a recommendation
from Faculty Council to Faculty which he would move. The Secretary
moved, seconded by Professor D.,
that Appendices B and C be deleted from the document.
The Secretary said that Faculty Council had felt that these appendices
did not achieve their objective. It was recognized that what the committee had tried to do was to represent the fact that Professors work
during the summer and while on sabbatical leave; however, the form of
these appendices it was felt by Council would be counterproductive in
achieving this objective.
Professor B. said that he felt it was necessary to defend Professors
against assumptions of idleness. It was a natural reaction to want to
explain what we do during the summer. He said that one member of
Council had said that this was the only part of the brief he had enjoyed.
Professor B. said that the appendices were anecdotal and personal and
might achieve some sympathy for professors. Professor 0. said that if
it came to revisions, was it a question of dropping the appendices or
keeping them. He thought they could be moderated somewhat. If this
were not possible, he would support the motion. Upon being put to the
vote, the motion was carried by fourteen votes to eleven.
An Open Letter from David Braybrooke

Faculty Council Arts & Science
Friends: I showed the minutes of your meeting of 29 September to Professor Green and held a conversation of sorts with him. He told me that
370
APPENDIX A
in general he had felt, turn by turn, amazed, mortified, and amused by

the reception of the literal (though selective) account of one of his typical days. Amazed, he said, at the variety of reactions. Some enjoyed
it, but thought it gave a picture too enviably agreeable. Others thought
it unbearably grim. He went on, I was mortified to find so extensive
a mismatch between my colleagues sense of humor and my own. Not
only, it appears, do we differ in the number and kinds of things we find
funny. We evidently strongly disagree on whether the least bit of life
and humour has a place in a public document. Really, I said; I suspect youre ready to put in a joke anywhere. Whenever I think of one,
he replied, without, it seemed to me, a trace of penitence.
But what, I asked, amused you about the reactions? Why, he
said, they were at such cross purposes. Some said the account was
ridiculously far from giving an accurate picture of a serious persons existence. Others evidently thought the degree of industry that it described
was wildly improbable. Where was the time needed for family and
household concerns, not to speak of relaxation? Some specially gifted
people managed at one and at the same time to think it too frivolous and
too serious besides.
Ah, I said, maybe thats because you yourself make a mixed impression. Come clean: Which is the real you, too frivolous, or too serious? He rejoined, emphatically, though rather unhelpfully, Both. But
the frivolous side hardly showed up in this account. Like G.E. Moore Id
rather give close study to The National Lampoon any day than write philosophy, and there was nothing about that. I protested, Didnt Moore
speak of reading novels? The National Lampoon wasnt even around in
his day, for goodness sake.
Green said, I read novels, too; besides, Im much more frivolous
than Moore was. I thought whoever wrote the account was a bit heavyhanded. In fact, it looks to me as though he himself had an overdose of
public solemnity. I understand he left out a lot of colorful data as not
being to the point. Even so he didnt succeed in being solemn enough,
did he? Nothing about romance, kisses, fond embraces, making music,
sharing an apple with Cherubino (the canary), playing fetch and tug
with the Corgithough he did get something in about dishwashing. I
AN OPEN LETTER FROM DAVID BRAYBROOKE
371
pointed out, If any of that stuff had been in the account, it would have
struck even more people as completely frivolous. Exactly, he said;
yet it would have been truer to life.
I put it to him: Do you mean to say that the picture as it stands is
more serious than frivolous? I do, he said. But, I asked, dont you
realize that either way it has jeopardized your chances of exercising any
influence in faculty affairs? What chance, for example, do you now have
of being elected to the tenure committee, or the promotions committee,
or Faculty Council? He grinned; but it was not merely a grin; it was a
gleeful, even exultant expression. It was as if, to everybodys surprise,
including his own, he had just pulled off a minor coup.
It may be worse for you, I said, if youre seriously taken to be living by such a standard of industry. A look of concern crossed Greens
face. I wouldnt want to be taken, he said, to be leaving no room for
joie de vivre. Shouldnt any serious academic find joy in his work, research as well as teaching? We work, declares Delacroix, not only to
produce but to give value to time. If enjoying work at least as much
as I do is uncommon at Dalhousie, then I must say it will be a better
university when the enjoyment is more common. I hope some people
who feel the same way will continue to creep into those committees, if
only by accident.
I asked, Where did you get that nugget from Delacroix? He answered, From my frivolous side; I was reading a book of aphorisms,
when I should have been doing something more ambitious. Joking
again, I commented; what are you going to do now, spared for the
rest of your career the prospect of serving on any of those committees?
This time he smiled, just like Moore, seraphically. Ah, he said, Ill
never want for something to do.
Appendix B
David Braybrookes Publications
1955-2005
Books
With C. E. Lindblom. A Strategy of Decision: Policy Evaluation as a
Social Process. New York: The Free Press, 1963. Paperback edition,
1970. Translated into Portuguese as Una Estrategia de Deciso Social.
Rio de Janeiro: Zahar Editores, 1972.
Philosophical Problems of the Social Sciences. New York: Macmillan, 1965. Edited, contributing an introduction and an integrating running commentary.
Three Tests for Democracy: Personal Rights; Human Welfare; Collective Preference. New York: Random House, 1968.
Traffic Congestion Goes through the Issue Machine (in the United
Kingdom, 1963 1968): A Case Study In Issue Processing, Illustrating a
New Approach. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1974.
Ethics in the World of Business. Philosophy and Society Series. Totowa, N.J.: Rowman and Littlefield, 1983. Edited, contributing several
chapters (see below, under Chapters in Books) and an integrating running commentary.
Philosophy of Social Science. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall,
1987. [Foundations of Philosophy Series].
Meeting Needs. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987.
With B. Brown and P. K. Schotch. Logic on the Track of Social
Change. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995. [Clarendon Library of Logic
and Philosophy].
373
374
APPENDIX B
Social Rules: Origin; Character; Logic; Change. Boulder and Oxford: Westview Press (HarperCollins), 1996. Edited, contributing several chapters (see below, under Chapters in Books) and an integrating
running commentary.
Moral Objectives, Rules, and the Forms of Social Change. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1998.
Natural Law Modernized. Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
2001.
Utilitarianism: Restorations; Repairs; Renovations. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. 2004.
Analytical Political Philosophy: From Discourse, Edification. Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 2005.
Journal Articles
Farewell to the New Welfare Economics. Review of Economic Studies
22 (June 1955): 180 193.
Berkeley on the Numerical Identity of Ideas. Philosophical Review
64 (October 1955): 631 636.
Professor Stevenson, Voltaire, and the Case of Admiral Byng. Journal of Philosophy 53 (November 1956): 787 796.
Vincula Vindicata. Mind 66 (April 1957): 222 227.
The Expanding Universe of Political Philosophy. Review of Metaphysics 11 (June 1958): 648 672.
Diagnosis and Remedy in Marxs Doctrine of Alienation. Social
Research 25 (Autumn 1958): 325 345.
The Relevance of Norms to Political Description. American Political Science Review 52 (December 1958): 989 1006.
Authority as a Subject of Social Science and Philosophy. Review
of Metaphysics 13 (March 1960): 469 485.
The Ethical Control of Politics. Ethics 70 (July 1960): 316 321.
With Others. Some Questions for Miss Anscombe about Intention.
Analysis 22 (January 1962): 49 54.
Collective and Distributive Generalization in Ethics. Analysis 23
(December 1962): 45 48.
JOURNAL ARTICLES
375
Personal Beliefs without Private Languages. Review of Metaphysics

16 (June 1963): 672 686.
The Mystery of Executive Success Re-examined. Administrative
Science Quarterly 8 (March 1964): 533 560.
How Are Moral Judgments Connected with Displays of Emotion?
Dialogue 4 (September 1965): 206 223.
The Choice Between Utilitarianisms. American Philosophical Quarterly 4 (January 1967): 28 38.
Un Esempio Americano di Gestione Operaia. Biblioteca della Libert (Gennaio Febbraio 1968): 23 38.
Taking Liberties with the Concept of Rules. The Monist 52 (July
1968): 329 358.
Refinements of Culture in Large Scale History. History and Theory, Beiheft 9 (1969): 39 63.
Three Separable Tests (Reply to review essays by Robert Ginsberg
and Joseph Margolis on Three Tests for Democracy), Philosophy Forum
9 (March 1971): 140-147.
Dialectic in History: Rejoinder to Professor Mulhollands Comments. Dialogue 10 (March 1971): 103 108.
The Firm but Untidy Correlativity of Rights and Obligations. Canadian Journal of Philosophy 1 (March 1972): 351 363.
With Alexander Rosenberg. Getting the War News Straight: the
Actual Situation in the Philosophy of Science. American Political Science Review 66 (September 1972): 818-826.
With Alexander Rosenberg. Anti-Behaviourism in the Hour of Its
Disintegration. (A review essay on Explanation in the Behavioural Sciences, ed. Robert Borger & Frank Cioffi.) Philosophy of the Social
Sciences, (December 1972), 355-63.
The Logical Character of Verdicts: A Case Study. University of
Toronto Law Journal (Autumn 1972): 221 236.
Two Blown Fuses in Goldmans Analysis of Power. Philosophical
Studies 24 (November 1973): 369 377.
Utilitarianism with a Difference: Rawlss Position in Ethics. (A
critical notice of John Rawls, A Theory of Justice). Canadian Journal
of Philosophy 3 (December 1973): 303 331.
376
APPENDIX B
The Philosophical Scene in Canada. Canadian Forum 53 (January

1974): 29 34.
From Economics to Aesthetics: The Rectification of Preferences.
Nos 8 (March 1974): 13 24.
Comment mettre a` lepreuvre le soupcon selon lequel une croyance
est ideologique? Bulletin de la Societe de Philosophie du Quebec (aout
1975): 47 49.
The Insoluble Problem of the Social Contract. Dialogue 15 (March
1976): 3 37.
A la recherche dune justice de structure au Nouveau Brunswick.
Philosophiques 3 (avril 1976): 123-129.
Still at the Fuse Box, Arguing with Goldman about the Power Supply. Philosophical Studies 30 (October 1976): 269 272.
Critical notice of Peter D. McClelland, Causal Explanation and Model
Building in History, Economics And the New Economic History. In History and Theory (1977): 337 354.
Our Natural Bodies, Our Social Rights. (A comment on a paper
by Samuel C. Wheeler III), Nos 14 (May 1980): 195 202.
The Maximum Claims of Gauthiers Bargainers: Are the Fixed Social Inequalities Acceptable? Dialogue 21 (September 1982): 411 429.
Rejoinder to Gauthiers reply: 445 448.
The Possibilities of Compromise. (A review essay on Compromise
in Ethics, Law, and Politics (Nomos XXI), edited by J. R. Pennock and
J. W. Chapman.) Ethics 93 (October 1982): 139 150.
Preferences Opposed to the Market: Grasshoppers vs. Ants on Security, Inequality, and Justice. Social Philosophy and Policy 2 (Autumn
1984): 101 114.
Work Related Ethical Attitudes: Commentary. Business & Professional Ethics 3 (Winter 1984): 41 42.
Scale, Combination, and Opposition: A Rethinking of Incrementalism. (A review essay on Jennifer Hochschild, The New American
Dilemma.) Ethics 95 (July 1985): 920 933.
Marxism and Technical Change: Nicely Told, But Not the Full
Contradictory Story. (Critical notice of two books relating to Marx-
JOURNAL ARTICLES
377
ism by Jon Elster.) Canadian Journal of Philosophy 16 (March 1986):

123 136.
La cicala e la formica: una parabola sul mercato. Biblioteca della
Liberta 93 (Aprile Giugno 1986): 5 22. (Italian translation of Preferences Opposed to the Market: Grasshoppers vs. Ants on Security,
Inequality, and Justice.)
Economic Thinking in Political Science: Maximizing on the Way
to Tautology. Manuscrito 10 (1987), 19-42.
Social Contract Theorys Fanciest Flight. Ethics 97 (July, 1987):
750-764.
Thoughtful Happiness. (A review essay on James Griffin, Well
Being, and Richard Warner, Freedom, Environment, and Happiness.)
Ethics 99 (April 1989): 625 636.
Review essay on A. Sen et al., The Standard of Living. In Economics
and Philosophy 6 (Fall 1990): 339-350.
Exaugural Lecture: Conceptual Tunnelling B A Moles Eye View
of Philosophy. Dalhousie Review 70 (Fall 1990): 288-306.
The Natural Law of Moral Education. The Vital Nexus 1 (May
1991): 26-32.
No Virtues Without Rules; No Rules Without Virtues. Social Theory and Practice 17 (Summer 1991): 139-156.
Liberalisms Claim to Culture. (Critical notice of Will Kymlicka,
Liberalism, Community and Culture.) Dialogue 30 (Spring 1991): 117121.
Preface to The Future of Post-Modernism. In Transactions of the
Royal Society of Canada, 6th series, 3 (1992): 99-106.
Inward and Outward with the Modern Self. (A critical notice of
Charles Taylor, Sources of the Self.) Dialogue 33 (Winter 1994): 101108.
Economic Theory Stalled: Model Theoretic Institutionalism as a
Way Forward. (A critical notice of books by A. Rosenberg and D.
Hausman.) Dialogue 34 (Summer 1995): 623-631.
With Herbert A. Simon. In Memoriam: Lewis Anthony Dexter.
PS: Political Science and Politics 28 (September 1995): 545-546.
378
APPENDIX B
Justice in Jeopardy If Needs Not Met: A Reply to Gillian Brock.

Dialogue 37 (Fall 1998): 799-804.
The General Theory of Absurdities in Daily Life and Politics. Dalhousie Review 80 (Spring 2000): 45-63.
Moral Rigidity Inside and Outside the Law. Public Affairs Quarterly 16 (April 2002): 173-188.
A Progressive Approach to Personal Responsibility for Global Beneficence. The Monist 86 (April 2003): 301-322
With Michael Bailey. R. A. Dahls Philosophy of Democracy, Exhibited in His Essays. Annual Review of Political Science 6 (2003):
99-118.
Toward an Alliance Between the Issue-Processing Approach and
Pragma-Dialectical Analysis. Argumentation 17 (2003): 513-35. (DB
served as honorary editor of the special issue on Conversation, Argumentation, and the Resolution of Issues, in which this article appeared
and also wrote a brief introduction to the issue.)
What Truth Does the Emotive-Imperative Answer to the OpenQuestion Argument Leave to Moral Judgments? Journal of Value Inquiry 37 (2003): 341-52.
The Relation of Utilitarianism to Natural Law Theory. The Good
Society to appear 2004 or 2005.
Where Does the Moral Force of the Concept of Needs Reside and
When? Philosophy to appear 2004 or 2005.
Chapters in Books
The Public Interest: The Present and Future of the Concept. In Carl
J. Friedrich, ed., The Public Interest (Nomos V). New York: Atherton
Press, 1962, 129-154.
An Illustrative Miniature Axiomatic System. In Nelson W. Polsby,
Robert A. Dentler, and Paul A. Smith, eds., Politics and Social Life.
Houghton Mifflin, 1963, 119-130.
Marx on Revolutionizing the Mode of Production. In Carl J. Friedrich,
ed., Revolution (Nomos VIII). New York: Atherton Press, 1966, 240246.
CHAPTERS IN BOOKS
379
Economics and Rational Choice. In Paul Edwards, ed., The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, vol. II. New York: Macmillan & Free Press,
1967, 454-458.
Ideology. In Paul Edwards, ed., The Encyclopedia of Philosophy,
vol. IV. New York: Macmillan & Free Press, 1967, 124-127.
The Duality of Politics and Ethics. In The Seventh Inter American
Congress of Philosophy: Proceedings of the Congress. Quebec: Les
Presses de lUniversite Laval, 1967, 150-161.
Skepticism of Wants, and Certain Subversive Effects of Corporations on American Values. In Human Values and Economic Policy
(N.Y.U. Institute of Philosophy for l966), edited by Sidney Hook. New
York: New York University Press, 1967, 224-239.
Let Needs Diminish that Preferences May Prosper. In Studies in
Moral Philosophy, American Philosophical Quarterly Monograph Series, no. 1. Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1968, 86-107.
Values and Managers: Private Production of Public Goods. In Kurt
Baier and Nicholas Rescher, eds., Values and the Future. New York:
Free Press, 1969, 368-388.
The Logic of the Succession of Cultures. In Howard E. Kiefer and
Milton K. Munitz, eds., Mind, Science, and History, Vol.II of Contemporary Philosophic Thought: The International Philosophy Year Conferences at Brockport. Albany: State University of New York Press,
197O, 270-283.
Revolution Intelligible or Unintelligible. In Robert H. Grimm and
Alfred F. Mackay, eds., Society: Revolution and Reform, Proceedings
of the 1969 Oberlin Colloquium in Philosophy. Cleveland: Press of
Case Western Reserve University, 1971, 93-118. Reply to comment by
Marshall Cohen, 129-134.
Comment on re apportionment and political democracy. In Nelson
W.Polsby, ed., Re apportionment in the 70s. Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1971, 112-118.
With Alexander Rosenberg. Vincula Revindicata., In Tom Beauchamp,
ed., Philosophical Problems of Causation. Encino & Belmont:CA Dickenson, 1974, 217-222.
The Meaning of Participation and of Demands for It. In J. R. Pen-
380
APPENDIX B
nock and J.W. Chapman, Participation in Politics (Nomos XVI). New

York: Lieber Atherton, 1975, 54-88.
Variety among Hierarchies of Preference. In C. A. Hooker, J. J.
Leach, and E. F. McClennen, eds., Foundations and Applications of Decision Theory, vol. I.. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel, 1978, 55-65.
Policy Formation with Issue Processing and Transformation of Issues. In C. A. Hooker, J. J. Leach, and E. F. McClennen, eds., Foundations and Applications of Decision Theory, vol. II. Dordrecht, Holland:
D. Reidel, 1978, 1-16.
Self Interest in Times of Revolution and Repression: Comment on
Professor Tullocks Analysis. In H. J. Johnson, J. J. Leach, and R. G.
Muehlmann, eds., Revolutions, Systems and Theories. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel, 1979, 61-74.
Through Epistemology to the Depths of Political Illusion. In Maria
J. Falco, ed., Through the Looking Glass: Epistemology and the Conduct of Political Inquiry. Washington, D.C.: University Press of America, 1979, 59-82.
With Peter K. Schotch. Cost Benefit Analysis Under the Constraint
of Meeting Needs. In Norman E. Bowie, ed., Ethical Issues and Government. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1981, 176-197.
Work: A Cultural Ideal Ever More in Jeopardy. In P. A. French,
T. E. Uehling, Jr, and H. K. Wettstein, eds., Social and Political Philosophy: Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 7. Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota Press, 1982, 321-341.
Making Justice Practical. In D. Braybrooke and M. Bradie, eds.,
Social Justice. Bowling Green, Ohio: Bowling Green Studies in Applied Philosophy, 1982, 1-14. Rejoinder to comment by James P. Sterba,
20 23.
Can Democracy Be Combined with Federalism or with Liberalism? In J. R. Pennock and J. W. Chapman, eds., Liberal Democracy
(Nomos XXV). New York: New York University Press, 1983, 109-118.
Justice and Injustice in Business. In Tom Regan, ed., Just Business: New Introductory Essays in Business Ethics, edited by Tom Regan. New York: Random House, 1983, 167-201.
Putting Things Together: Three Leading Subjects of Moral Con-
CHAPTERS IN BOOKS
381
cern in the World of Business, in D. Braybrooke, ed., Ethics in the

World of Business. Totowa, N. J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983, 461470.
Moral Questions About the Business System as a Whole. In D.
Braybrooke, ed., Ethics in the World of Business. Totowa, N. J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983, 471-477.
La science et la technologie nous permettront elles de continuer
travailler? Question que lideologie engendre dans la pensee bourgeoise
et aussi dans celle de Marx. In C. Savary et C. Panaccio, eds., Lidologie
et les strategies de la raison. La Salle, QC: Hurtubuise, 1984, 171-200.
Contemporary Marxism on the Autonomy, Efficacy, and Legitimacy of the Capitalist State. In Roger Benjamin and Stephen L. Elkin,
eds. The Democratic State. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas,
1985, 59-86.
A Public Goods Approach to the Theory of the General Will. In J.
Porter, and R. Vernon, eds.,Unity and Plurality in Politics: Festschrift
for Frederick Barnard. London: Croom Helm, 1986, 75-92..
The Sorites: Logic Astray for Want of Observation. In The Fact
of the Matter: Essays in Honour of Lawrence Resnick. Burnaby, B.C.:
Department of Philosophy, Simon Fraser University, 1988, 1-4.
The Conditions on Which Rules Exist. In P. A. Schlipp and L.
E. Hahn, The Philosophy of Georg Henrik von Wright, The Library of
Living Philosophers La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1989, 187-209.
Campaigning for Increased Measures of Safety: Paradox, The Shadow
of a Paradox, and a Conceptual Way Out. In J. P. Rothe, ed., Challenging the Old Order: Towards New Directions in Traffic Safety Theory,
edited by J. P. Rothe. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Books, 1990,
169-182.
How Do I Presuppose Thee? Let Me Count The Ways: The Relation of Regularities to Rules in Social Science. In P. A. French, T.
E. Uehling, Jr, and H. K. Wettstein, eds., The Philosophy of the Human Sciences: Midwest Studies in Philosophy, vol. XV. Notre Dame,
Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press, 1990, 80-93.
Gauthiers Foundation for Ethics Under the Test of Application.
In Peter Vallentyne, ed., Contractarianism and Rational Choice. New
382
APPENDIX B
York: Cambridge University Press, 1991, 56-70.

Meeting Needs: Towards a New Needs-Based Ethics. In K. Aman,
ed., Ethical Principles for Development. Montclair, N.J.: Institute for
Critical Thinking, 1991, 80-90.
With Arthur P. Monahan. Common Good. In L. Becker and C.
Becker, Encyclopedia of Ethics. New York: Garland Publishing, 1992,
Vol. I, 175-178.
With L. A. Dexter. Corruption. In L. Becker and C. Becker, eds.,
Encyclopedia of Ethics. New York: Garland Publishing, 1992, Vol. II,
218-220.
Needs and Interests. In L. Becker and C. Becker, eds., Encyclopedia of Ethics. New York: Garland Publishing, 1992, Vol. II, 894-897.
Two Conceptions of Needs in Marxs Writings. In R. Beehler et
al., eds., On he Track of Reason: Essays in Honor of Kai Nielsen. Boulder and Oxford: Westview Press, 1992, 119-133.
The Social Contract and Property Rights Across the Generations.
In Peter Laslett and James S. Fishkin, eds., Justice Between Age Groups
and Generations [Philosophy, Politics, and Society, 6th Series]. New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1992, 107-126.
Y-a-t-il une connaissance philosophique de la societe? In J. Proust
and E. Schwartz, eds., La connaissance philosophique: essais sur loeuvre
de Gilles-Gaston Granger. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France,
1995, 81-90.
Interests and Needs. In P. H. Werhane and R. E. Freeman, eds.,
Blackwell Encyclopedic Dictionary of Business Ethics. Oxford: Blackwell, 1997, 341-3.
AThe Representation of Rules in Logic and Their Definition. In
David Braybrooke, ed., Social Rules: Origin; Character; Logic; Change.
Boulder and Oxford: Westview Press/HarperCollins, 1996, 3-19.
Changes of Rules, Issue-Circumscription, and Issue-Processing.
In David Braybrooke, ed., Social Rules: Origin; Character; Logic;
Change. Boulder and Oxford: Westview Press/HarperCollins, 1996,
75-83.
Logic and Historical Enquiry. In D. Woolf, ed., A Global Encyclopedia of Historical Writing. New York: Garland, 1998, Vol. II, 570-1.
BOOK REVIEWS
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Philosophy of Social Science, Contemporary Theories (Schools).

In E. Craig, ed., The Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. London:
Routledge, 1998, Vol. VIII, 838-47.
The Concept of Needs, with a Heart-Warming Offer of Aid to Utilitarianism. In G. Brock, ed., Necessary Goods: Our Responsibilities to
Meet Others Needs. Rowman and Littlefield, 1998.
Common Good. In C.B. Gray, ed., The Philosophy of Law: An
Encyclopedia. New York: Garland, 1999, 125-7.
With Arthur P. Monahan. Common Good. In L. Becker and C.
Becker, eds, Encyclopedia of Ethics, 2d ed. New York and London:
Routledge, 2000, Vol. I, 262-66. (A revision of the article on the same
topic in the first edition, 1992.)
Interests. In L. Becker and C. Becker, eds.,Encyclopedia of Ethics,
2d ed. New York and London: Routledge, 2000, Vol. II, 868-71.
Needs. In L. Becker and C. Becker, eds., Encyclopedia of Ethics,
2d ed. New York and London: Routledge, 2000, Vol. II, 1220-24. (This
article and the one just mentioned give separate, revised treatments of
two topics that the first edition combined in one article.)
(The second edition of Encyclopedia of Ethics carried forward unchanged, except for an addition to the bibliography, an article on Corruption written together with the late Lewis Anthony Dexter.)
Decision Making Systems: Personal and Collective. In N.J. Smelser
and P. B. Baltes (eds.)The International Encyclopedia of Social and Behavioural Sciences. Amsterdam and New York: Elsevier, 2000, Vol. V,
3315-18.
Sidgwicks Critique of Nozick. On line in a web site on utilitarianism established by Paul Lyon.
Book Reviews
Of W.D. Lamont, The Value Judgment. In Philosophical Review (April
1957): 255 8.
Of Peter Laslett, ed., Philosophy, Politics, and Society. In Philosophical Review (July 1958): 418 421.
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APPENDIX B
Of Richard W. Sterling, Ethics in a World of Power: the Political

Ideas of Friedrich Meinecke. In Ethics (July 1959): 292 294.
Of Elting E. Morison, ed., The American Style: Essays in Value and
Performance. In Ethics (October 1959): 73 75.
Of Felix E. Oppenheim, Dimensions of Freedom; An Analysis. In
Philosophical Review (October 1963): 524 528.
Of Arthur S. Banks and Robert B. Textor, A Cross Polity Survey. In
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science (February 1965):
142-144.
Of Lon L. Fuller, The Morality of Law. In Dialogue (March 1965):
441 444.
Of Samuel I. Shuman, Legal Positivism: Its Scope and Limitations.
In University of Toronto Law Journal (1965): 190 194.
Of Neil A. McDonald, Politics: A Study of Control Behavior. In
Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science (February 1966):
108 109.
Of R. S. Downie, Government Action and Morality. In Journal of
Philosophy (June 1966): 363 367.
Of Arthur C. Danto, Analytical Philosophy of History. In Philosophy of Science (December 1967): 388 392.
Of Herbert Marcuse, Negotiations and An Essay on Liberation. In
Trans action (October 1969): 51 54.
Of Gordon Leff, History and Social Theory. In History and Theory
10 (1971): 122-134.
Of Virginia Held, The Public Interest and Individual Interests. In
Journal Of Philosophy (April 1972): 192 202.
With Alexander Rosenberg. Anti Behaviourism in the Hour of its
Disintegration. (A review essay on Explanation in the Behavioural Sciences, edited by Robert Borger and Frank Cioffi.) In Philosophy of the
Social Sciences (December 1972): 355 363.
Of Leon Dion, Societe et politique la vie des groupes. In Canadian
Journal of Political Science (September 1973): 522 523.
Of J.J.C. Smart and Bernard Williams, Utilitarianism: For and Against.
In International Studies in Philosophy (Fall 1975): 522-523.
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Of Alan Montefiore, ed., Philosophie et relations interpersonnelles,

jointly with a compte rendu by G. G. Granger of the companion volume of essays by anglophone philosophers, Philosophy and Personal
Relations, edited by Alan Montefiore. In Dialogue (March 1975): 159
167.
Of S. Korner, ed., Explanation. In Philosophical Quarterly (January
1977): 74 78.
Of J. Manninen and R. Tuomela, eds., Essays on Explanation and
Understanding. In Philosophical Review (July 1978): 485 489.
Of S. I. Benn and G. W. Mortimore, eds., Rationality and the Social
Sciences. In Australian Journal of Philosophy (December 1978): 256
261.
Of Dennis H. Wrong, Power: Its Forms, Bases and Uses. In Canadian Journal of Political Science 14 (June 1981): 437 438.
Of Stanley A. Hoffman, Ethics in International Relations. In Canadian Philosophical Reviews (April/June 1982): 107 110.
Of Jane J. Mansbridge, Beyond Adversary Democracy. In Ethics
(October 1982): 153-155.
Of William Dray, Perspectives on History. In Dialogue (December
1982): 782 783.
Of L. Armour and E. Trott, The Faces of Reason. In Queens Quarterly (Autumn 1983): 688 692.
Of Allan Moscovitch and Glenn Drove, eds., Inequality: Essays on
the Political Economy of Social Welfare. In Labour/Le Travailleur (Autumn 1983): 290 291.
Of Richard W. Miller, Analyzing Marx: Morality, Power, and History. In Dalhousie Review (Spring 1984): 190 193.
Of W. L. Robison et al., eds., Profits and Professions: Essays in
Business and Professional Ethics. In Ethics (October 1984): 193 194.
Of Frederick Schick, Having Reasons: An Essay on Rationality and
Sociality. In Dalhousie Review (Fall 1984): 626-629.
With J. Fingard, of A. W. B. Simpson, Cannibalism and the Common
Law. In Ethics (April 1985): 745 747.
Of Richard Ashcraft, Revolutionary Politics and Lockes Two Treatises of Government. In Dalhousie Review 66 (Fall 1986): 382-385.
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APPENDIX B
Of Gregory Kavka, Hobbesian Moral and Political Theory and Jean

Hampton, Hobbes and the Social Contract Tradition. In The Dalhousie
Review 66 (Winter 1986/87): 540-545.
Of Amartya Sen et al., The Standard of Living, In Economics and
Philosophy Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.
Of Arthur P. Monahan, Consent, Coercion and Limit. In Dalhousie
Review 67 (Summer/Fall 1987): 367-369.
Of Alan Irwin, Risk and the Control of Technology. In Risk Abstracts
(July 1988): 118 119.
Of David R. Shumway, Michel Foucault. In Dalhousie Review 69
(Summer 1989): 292-293.
Of Ian Shapiro, Political Criticism. In Canadian Journal of Political
Science 24 (September 1991): 670-671.
Of Maurice Cranston, The Noble Savage: Jean Jacques Rousseau,
1754-1762. In American Political Science Review 86 (September 1992):
778.
Of L. W. Sumner, Welfare, Happiness, and Ethics, in Philosophy in
Review, 17, 2(April 1997), 141-4.
Of Shadia Drury, Leo Strauss and the American Right, in Globe &
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Notes on Contributors
Nathan Brett is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He teaches philosophy of law and politics
and the history of modern philosophy. Publications include many papers
on Humes views and discussions of political and legal issues relating
to consent, discrimination, punishment, collective rights, property rights
and justice, and patents on living organisms. (nbrett@dal.ca)
Bryson Brown is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at the University of Lethbridge. His philosophical interests center on logic, especially paraconsistent logic, and philosophy of science. He is co-author,
with David Braybrooke and Peter Schotch, of Logic on the Track of
Social Change (1995). Recent articles include Chunk and Permeate
(with Graham Priest) in the Journal of Philosophical Logic, and The
Pragmatics of Empirical Adequacy in the Australasian Journal of Philosophy. (brown@uleth.ca)
Steven Burns is Professor of Philosophy at Dalhousie University and
Professor of Contemporary Studies at the University of Kings College,
and has served as Chair of both programmes. He has recently published
investigations of Otto Weiningers influence on Wittgenstein (see, e.g.,
Wittgenstein Reads Weininger, eds. D. Stern and B. Szabados, CUP,
2004), and is currently working on some studies of moral philosophy
in literature. He has been a colleague of David Braybrooke since the
1960s. (burns@dal.ca)
Richmond Campbell is George Munro Professor Emeritus at Dalhousie University. He is the author of Illusions of Paradox: A Feminist
Epistemology Naturalized and Self-Love and Self-Respect and co-editor
of Naturalized Moral Epistemology and Paradoxes of Rationality and
Cooperation. His publications include articles in moral theory, epistemology, feminist theory, logic, philosophy of biology, and philosophy
387
388
NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
of mind. He is currently preparing a book on moral judgment. (richmond@dal.ca)

Sue Campbell is Associate Professor of Philosophy and Coordinator
of Womens Studies at Dalhousie University. She is the author of Interpreting the Personal: Expression and the Formation of Feeling (1997),
and Relational Remembering: Rethinking the Memory Wars (2003).
(campbesl@dal.ca)
Michael Hymers is currently Associate Professor of Philosophy at
Dalhousie University. He received his PhD from the University of Alberta in 1993 and held Postdoctoral Fellowships from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the Calgary Institute for the Humanities. He has published numerous articles on questions concerning epistemology, philosophy of language, metaphysics,
Kant, Wittgenstein, and neopragmatism. His book Philosophy and Its
Epistemic Neuroses (Westview Press) appeared in 2000.
(michael.hymers@dal.ca)
Edna Keeble is an associate professor of political science at Saint
Marys University and holds a Ph.D. from Dalhousie University (1994).
As one of Braybrookes many graduate students who has been influenced not only by the weight of his ideas but also by the strength of his
character, she regards both his scholarly work and his life well-lived as
a continuing inspiration to be generous to others in time, monies and
friendship. (edna.keeble@smu.ca)
Meredith Ralston is an Associate Professor in the Departments of
Womens Studies and Political Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University. She is also a documentary filmmaker and has directed two films
on women and politics for the National Film Board of Canada. Kiefer
Sutherland narrates her latest film, on Filipino bar girls and sex tourism.
She has just been included in the 2005 edition of Canadian Whos Who.
(MRALSTON@MSVU1.msvu.ca)
Peter Schotch is a Professor of Philosophy at Dalhousie University.
He received his university education at the University of Waterloo. By
training, he is a formal logician with an interest in modal and manyvalued logics (which were then not very respectable areas of research
a fact which may go some way to explaining his interest). Over the years
389
Schotch has become much more interested in applications of formal science which explains his interest in collaborating with David Braybrooke
and Bryson Brown on the book Logic on the Track of Social Change.
(peter.schotch@dal.ca)
Susan Sherwin, FRSC, is a University Research Professor at Dalhousie University. She is a Professor of Philosophy, Bioethics, and
Womens Studies. Her principal research interests are in feminist approaches to health care ethics. Her publications include No Longer
Patient: Feminist Ethics and Health Care(1992), and The Politics of
Womens Health: Exploring Agency and Autonomy, with the Canadian
Feminist Health Care Ethics Research Network (1998).
(susan.sherwin@dal.ca)
S. L. (Sharon) Sutherland, FRSC, is Visiting Professor at the School
of Political Studies at the University of Ottawa, working closely with
the Public Administration Program of the School. She is also adjunct
professor in the Department of Political Science at Dalhousie, where she
benefited from David Braybrookes collegiality in the 1970s, and a consultant to government. Beginning her career in attitude theory in political and social psychology (for example, Patterns of Belief and Action,
University of Toronto Press, 1981), she later switched to study of the
representative institutions and bureaucracy (Bureaucracy in Canada,
Control and Reform, University of Toronto Press, 1985), ministerial responsibility, machinery of government (the politics of institutional design), and management policies and their political implications. She has
published a number of journal articles in these areas, as well as in the
ethics of office holding.
Tom Vinci is Professor of Philosophy at Dalhousie University in Halifax, arriving there upon completion of his Ph.D in Philosophy at the
University of Pittsburgh in 1977. He has been a colleague and friend
of David Braybrooke since then. Professor Vincis publications include
a book on Descartes, Cartesian Truth (Oxford, 1998), and articles in
Epistemology, Philosophy of Science, Decision Theory and the History
of Modern Philosophy. He lives in Halifax with his wife and three children. (vinci@dal.ca)
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Index
Meeting Needs, 53
flexible categories of work, 24
impaired thinking, 143
open question argument, 273
open-question argument, 301
partisan mutual adjustment, 143
scientific political science, 127
single-pass solution, 133
air pollution, 129

al-Qaeda, 111
alternative social states, 327
altruism, 223, 226, 227, 233, 241
Amartya Sen, 105
ameliorative activity, 147
Amnesty International, 117
analysing means, 134
Anscombe, E., 263
abject cosmopolitanism, 104
anti-personnel landmines, 103, 113,
accepted ways of doing things, 325
114
action
anti-personnel landmines treaty, 105
blocking, 333
apartheid, 289
virtual, 333
approved projects, 94
action type
Arthur Wellesley, 285
semantics of, 331
artists, 95
actions, 328
aspiration adaptation, 135
concatenation, 330
aspiration level, 137
more than bringing about propo- authority, 356
sitions, 330
autonomy, 67
active community practices, 121
axioms
actual moral situations, 297
for constraining possible needs,
Adam Smith, 226, 231, 234
77
aesthetic judgments, 277
Ayer, A., 261
agenda, 340
Ayer., 302
agenda policy, 159
Agrippan sceptic, 280
B.R. Berelson, 128
Aiken, H, 268
background beliefs, 285
410
411
basic beliefs, 280

is dynamic, 127
BRCAnalysis, 55
basic moral principles, 272
Brian Fry, 131
basic needs, 42
Brink, D., 254
basic social roles, 59
Brown, 343
Bayesian models
of rational decision, 256
Campbell, 218
behaviour, 345, 347
on naturalized epistemology, 218
behavioural principles, 346
Canadas human security agenda,
behavioural psychology, 349
115
behaviourally discriminable states, Canadian foreign aid policy, 116
355
Canadian foreign policy, 102, 122
belief-desire, 265
Carl Hempel, 196
theory of action, 251
Carl Rogers, 232
theory of moral judgement, 259, Cartesian sceptic, 291
265
Cartesian sceptical argument, 296
Bernard Weiner, 102
Cartesian scepticism, 283
Blackburn, S., 261
causal and intentional elements, 344
blocking, 344
census notion, 13
blocking operation, 348
certainty of moral propositions, 18
blocking operations, 343
certification of moral judgments, 276
bootstrap argument, 353
Charles Hamblin, 334
bootstrapping norms, 360
Chester Barnard, 139
Bosnia, 107
Chicagos Old First Ward, 129
bounded rationality, 131, 135, 136 civil society engagement, 114
bovine spongiform encephalopathy, cognitive limitations, 143
158
cognitivism
Brandom, 277, 278
vs non cognitivism, 259
Brandt, R., 259
vs non-cognitivism, 249
Braybrooke, 42, 48, 77
coherentism, 280, 313
as a theorist of participation, coherentist, 283
127
Cold War, 107, 110
Braybrooke and Lindblom, 132
collective discussion, 127
Braybrookes Cautions, 152
collectivities, 127
Braybrookes problem, 83
Commission on Human Security,
Braybrookes strategy
118
INDEX
412
commitment
central position of, 358
commitments
interpretive, 353
commodity value, 30
communal discussion, 151
community medicine, 87
community-approved projects, 92
complex problems, 148
comprehensively rational method,
131
comprehensively rational prescriptions, 133
computational routines, 132
concept of national responsibility,
105
conflict prevention, 113, 116
consequences
of action, 329
constraints, 77
constraints on epistemic contexts,
285
constructive competitiveness, 151
contemporary feminist epistemology, 17
context of debate, 283
contextual constraints on justification, 292
Contextualism
rejects epistemological realism,
284
contextualism, 279, 287
of use to Braybrooke, 289
Williams definition, 280
conventional policy goals, 148
conventionalism about mathematics, 288

conventions, 273
cooperatives, 162
Copp, D., 252
core social roles
relation to needs, 65
correctness of cultural decisions, 91
correspondence theory of truth and
moral claims, 277
cosmopolitan, 223, 231
cosmopolitan ethical considerations,
116
cosmopolitan ethics, 16, 103, 106,
225
cosmopolitanism, 104, 123
different versions share a common root, 104
distinguished from other approaches,
104
extreme, 104
moderate, 104
Cranford Pratt, 116
critical theorists, 201, 204
critical theory, 195, 200202, 204,
213
crude utilitarianism, 133
cultural evolution, 90
cultural parochialism, 227, 229, 233
culture
evolves without self-direction,
91
culture-independent standards, 91
Dancy, J., 257
David Annis, 279
413
David Braybrooke
direct inference, 352
directions of fit, 263
critic of privatization, 23
disabled
David Cohen, 143
many easily helped, 81
David Haekwon Kim, 245
discounting factor, 80
David Hollinger, 104
disinterested perspective, 235
David Lewis, 279
disjointed incrementalism, 147
David Miller, 104
dispositional genetic tests, 56
David Sloan Wilson, 240
distinction between ethics and metadecision environment, 139, 140
ethics, 272
decision-making in policy literature,
distribution of resources, 80, 93
126
Default and Challenge Model, 285 doctrine of equal regar, 108
default and challenge model, 290 dominance of terrorism, 105
Dudley Shapere, 345
default egoism, 223
as an account of moral moti- Dworkin, 40, 48
dynamic problems, 144
vation, 228
as misleading, 229
economic justice, 114
difficulty of avoiding, 228
in Shermans account of moti- education, 24
as a commodity, 29
vation, 230
not compatible with re-imagining, public vs private, 31
241
education as a human need, 42
definition
efficiency calculus, 137
persuasive, 306
efficient needs monsters, 87
definitions, 312
efficient utility monster, 90
deflationism, 278
egoism
Feinberg and Shavers work,
democracy
224
western industrialized, 12
Elliot Sober, 240
democratic deliberation, 128
Department of Public Safety and Elshtain, 110
Emergency Preparedness, eminist relational accounts
115
of social justice, 68
Descartes, 281
emotions and imperative, 273
development assistance, 112
emotive-imperative, 302
dialectical constraints, 285
emotivism, 274
414
empirical analysis, 133

empiricism, 356
endorsement, 274
enforcement, 359
entitlement, 79
entitlements
grounded in needs, 78
entitlements to resources, 77
environmental degradation, 113
environmental heuristic, 138
environmental heuristics, 134
epistemic bootstrap argument, 354
epistemic contextualism, 273
epistemic function of empathy, 228
epistemic justification, 19, 277, 310
epistemic priority, 287
and coherentism, 284
epistemically responsible, 287
Epistemological Realism, 281
epistemological realism, 272, 284,
287, 292, 293
epistemology, 302
epistemology of natural laws, 350
Epsteins example, 206
equal opportunity, 36, 37, 44, 46
equality in meeting needs, 42
error theory, 253, 260, 264
ethical justification, 18
ethical theory, 302
ethics and meta-ethics, 276
ethics of consequentialism, 146
ethics of individual responsibility,
117
ethics of state responsibility, 106
ethnic cleansing, 108
INDEX
evolutionary advantage, 359

exegetical hypothesis
very brave, 326
expensive technology, 86
expensive technology and research,
87
expressivist, 273
externalist moral realism, 254, 260,
262
fact-value, 205
fact-value dichotomy, 220
fact-value distinction, 200, 211
fact/value dichotomy, 219
feasible policy designs, 137
felicific calculus, 80
feminism
commitments of, 67
feminist
concern with autonomy, 68
relational account of persons,
65
feminist accounts of the self, 237
feminist empiricism, 214, 217
Feminist relational accounts, 67
feminist relational theory, 69
feminist standpoint, 211, 215
feminist theorists, 240
feminists
can build on Braybrookes theory, 67
Feuerbach, 295
first-order discourse, 312
first-order knowledge, 311
fixing jurisdictions, 151
folk psychological theory, 256
415
following a rule
deontological view, 337
foreign policy, 105
formal foundationalism, 302, 306
formal philosophers, 326
foundationalism, 280, 313
foundationalist, 283
foundations of policy analysis, 342
Fragmentation, 151
free market, 43
free-market, 38
freedom from fear, 111, 116
freedom from want, 111, 116
full rationality, 135
functionings
Sens concept of, 106
fundamental principle
of science, 350
global beneficence, 121

global community, 52
global economic injustices, 112
global poverty, 123
goal, 337
goal formation, 342
goal revision, 150
goal states
more than needs required, 339
goals and rules
used to interpret behavior, 351
good life, 89
good will, 325
Goodman, 352
governance and accountability, 113
grant and scholarship competitions,
95
grue, 352
gap between rich and poor, 24

gap in decision-making theory, 145
Gareth Evans, 109
gender equality, 114
general moral principles, 292
genetic corrections, 55
genetic disposition, 54
genetic disposition tests, 55
genetic dispositional testing, 69
genetic knowledge, 55
genetic susceptibility, 55
genetic susceptibility tests, 71
genetic testing, 54
Genevieve Lloyd, 224, 241
genocide, 108
Gibbard, A., 261
happiness, 80
Harding, 215, 217
Hare, R., 261
Harold Lasswell, 129
hedge-clipping models, 144
Hegel, 215
Herbert McClosky, 128
Herbert Simon, 130
Herman van Gunsteren, 130
heuristics, 140
hidden optimization, 138
hierarchical programs, 130
historical inquiry, 285
human beings
as relational entities, 54
human development, 105, 146
416
INDEX
human happiness, 147

incrementalism, 16, 131, 133, 138,
human needs
142, 143, 145
concept of restored, 52
conditions of failure, 152
human rights, 114
with utilitarianism, 146
human rights violations, 113
incrementalist experimentation, 154
human security, 102, 106, 111, 113, incrementalist thinkers, 144
115
incrementalist-utilitarian policy, 126
and Canadian foreign policy, individual analysts, 127
113
individual capacity for deliberation,
and charitable organizations, 123
127
and cosmopolitan ethics, 103
inductive standards, 357
defined broadly, 112
inefficient needs monsters, 87
in Canadian foreign policy, 117
inefficient utility monster, 90
its empirical application, 103
infinite regress of reasons, 282
human security thinking, 106
humanitarian intervention, 111, 113 injunction, 308
Hume, 234, 235, 251, 255, 264, injustice, 66
that warrants use of force, 108
269
institutional
blindness, 160
Humes concerns about induction,
institutional insurance, 149, 150
350
institutionalized interests, 152
Humean moral sentiment, 224
instrumental
ice cream cone semantics, 329
good, 321
identity, 85
insurgency within states, 105
imagination, 226
intelligibility of problems, 146
imagining
interest groups, 94
of the self, 234
interests
impartiality, 33
become shared, 243
imperative voice
orfdinary understanding of, 349 intermediate principles, 132
increase participation in delibera- internal opposition, 145
internalism
tion, 126
about justification, 281
incremental alternatives, 149, 150
Internalist moral realism, 258
incremental change, 148
incremental changes, 41
internalist moral realism, 256, 260,
incremental policies, 131, 158
262, 263
417
International Campaign to Ban Land-John Pollock, 286

mines, 113
just warriors, 109
International Commission on Inter- justice, 67, 73
vention and State Sovereignty, global, 16
102, 109
privatization a threat, 15
International Committee of the Red justification, 302
Cross, 114
holistic, 281
International Criminal Court, 103,
K. J. Arrow, 327
105
K.J. Arrow, 339
international relations, 16
Kaldor, 111
international security issues, 115
Kant, 48
interpretation
Keith DeRose, 279
of self and others, 362
Khadija Coxon, 225
interpretive, 195
with naturalist tendencies, 207 knowing
as a normative notion, 357
interpretive and naturalist questions
knowledge
of cause and effect, 292
in postmodernism, 209
Kofi Annan, 113, 118
interpretive methods, 213
Kosovo, 108
interpretive social scientists, 208
interpretive theorists, 197, 198
interpretive theory, 201, 203, 204,
214, 220
interpretive view, 216
intrinsic desirability, 296
intrinsic epistemic priority, 284
Iraq, 107
issues, 340
Jacobsen, R., 249
Jane Duran, 279
Jean Bethke Elshtain, 108
Jenna Woodrow, 272
Jill Sinclair, 114
Joan Tronto, 236
Jody Williams, 114
Joel Feinberg, 230
legacy policy, 159

liberal, 41, 67
liberal conception of personhood,
69
liberal conceptions of persons, 65
liberal individualist theories, 68
libertarian, 38
libertarianism, 39
Liebow, 207, 211
life-prolongation, 96
life-prolongation projects
need not be legitimate, 77
life-prolongation technology, 92
life-sustaining technologies, 82, 83
Lillian Smith, 245
Lindblom, 129
418
INDEX
Lloyd Axworthy, 114

meta-ethical principle, 290
logical positivists, 293
meta-ethics
longevity of older people, 86
various forms, 310
longevity-prolonging technology, 82 meta-language, 310
Longino, 217
metalanguage, 360
metaphor, 226
Medecins sans Frontieres, 117
of distance in Hume, 236
MacIntosh, D., 249
of leaving oneself, 232
Mackie, 291, 294, 298
metaphor of overcoming distance,
237
Mackies error theory, 296
metaphorical structures, 224
Mackie, J., 253, 259
metaphors
Margaret Urban Walker, 245
conceretizing empathy, 231
Mark Gwozdecky, 114
for empathy, 234
Marshall Dimock, 132
methodological necessities, 285
Martha Nussbaum, 104
Michael Moran, 159
Marx, 37, 205, 215
Marxist critique of ideology, 200, Michael Williams, 272, 279
215
Millikan, R., 264
Mary Douglas, 139
minority rights, 149
Mason Cash, 272
modern natural law theory, 43
mathematical judgments, 298
Mohamed Sahnoun, 109
maximizing, 138
Mohammed Ayoob, 108
McNaughton, D., 256, 258
Moore, 273, 301
means-end analysis, 134
moral belief, 253, 255, 262, 264,
medical services, 53
265, 269, 295
medical technology, 78, 84, 89
moral claims, 272
can extend life, 81
judged true, 274
drains resources, 77
pragmatic force of, 278
medical technology problem, 92
presuppositions must be true,
292
medicare, 46
meeting needs and taking personal moral content, 296
responsibility, 117
moral conventions, 298
meta-epistemology, 311
moral cosmopolitanism, 229, 231,
233
meta-ethical dimension, 310
meta-ethical justification, 18
moral discourse, 272
419
moral education, 224, 225, 237, 242,

basis for motivation, 18
243
Humes theory, 244
consequences of Braybrookes moral sentiment theories, 223, 234
account, 244
moral sentiment theory, 224, 236
Humes account, 234
role of imagination, 236
moral entitlements, 78, 94
moral subject, 65
moral epistemology, 302
moral theory, 274
moral experience, 295
moral truth
moral facts, 79, 292, 293
has no nature, 279
moral force
morality
argument for, 119
can it be factual, 79
moral goodness, 290
different kinds, 328
moral judgment, 18, 305
situational, 328
moral judgments, 272
morally evaluative terms, 274
just expressions of emotion, 273 morally permissible community enmust motivate, 273
dorsements, 97
necessary conditions for, 287 morally permissible preferences, 98
motivation
moral justification, 18, 301, 305
alternative model, 243
moral knowledge, 249, 251253,
267, 269, 294
motivational force, 273, 299
moral language, 273
multi-layered citizenship, 104
moral motivation, 222, 227, 255, multiplication of personal activity,
262
121
naturalized account, 234
mutual assured destruction, 107
options for, 234
moral philosophy, 324
Nancy Sherman, 223
applied to social science, 328 Nathan Brett, 272
moral practices, 297
natural facts, 348
moral properties, 290, 295, 296
natural law, 302
moral realism, 252, 253, 257, 272 natural law theory, 12
moral realists, 276, 298
natural laws, 352
moral relativism, 307
natural order
moral rules, 290
and justification, 355
moral scepticism, 291
natural regularities, 360
moral sentiment
naturalism, 195, 201, 204, 213, 359
420
naturalism and interpretive theory,

201
naturalist, 208
naturalistic, 203
naturalistic explanation, 345
naturalistic fallacy, 306
naturalistic social science, 203
naturalists, 195, 196, 198, 200
naturalized accounts of human motivation, 224
naturalized approach to moral motivation, 225
naturalized epistemology, 218
need
for a person to be alive, 82
for food, 43
needs, 11
meeting requires rules, 12
adventitious, 13, 52, 78
are a form of preferences,
70
as preferences, 66
very diverse, 13
and relationally defined persons,
86
and social goals, 338
as the basis of moral entitlements, 78
axiomatized, 92
axioms solve a problem, 94
basic, 89
bilogically given, 97
Braybrooke and Sen on, 105
co-tenability constraint, 98
confilict of, 86
INDEX
core concepts, 12
course-of-life, 13, 52, 5861,
78
and scientific discoveries, 67
as relational, 65
attached to disease, 72
BRCA testing, 61, 69, 70
difficulty of BRCA testing
as, 64
genetic test as, 72
health and life, 75
limit access to genetic testing, 74
priority of, 66
some universal, 13
take precedence, 70
technology as, 64
threatened by geneticization,
73
tied to social roles, 65
tracking, 13
created by projects, 77
criterion for inclusion, 59
defeasible, 84
effectiveness of different policies, 13
feminist consideration on, 15
for life extension not more pressing than other needs, 88
for life-extension technology,
83
for life-prolongation, 90, 95
have moral force, 117
individualist analysis, 85
legitimate classification as, 52
421
less empirical, 91
their role in evaluating public
policy, 13
location of, 84
needs and capabilities, 118
locus in groups, 86
making public policy respon- needs ethics, 94
needs monster
sive, 16
two kinds, 80
medical, 54, 55
medical demands for services, needs monsters, 96
15
needs-based ethics
medical technology for life expressing problem for, 82
tension, 15
needs:for indefinitely long life, 87
meeting them as a goal of so- needs:for life-prolonging medical
cial policy, 77
care, 54
minimum standard of provision, Nelson, 217
13
New Public Management, 130
no reliable distinction, 16
Nicholas Wheeler, 108
not grounding entitlements, 92 non-basic beliefs, 280
of a population, 87
non-governmental organizations, 105,
of citizens, 11
122
of older people, 85
normal decision-making, 147
of others as a limit, 93
normalization of prenatal testing,
68
ordered by importance, 82
normative
plasticity of, 97
facts, 348
policy should meet them, 127
no reduction to descriptive, 363
possibly determined by some
normative concepts
preferences, 99
grounded in natural facts, 362
potetial for conflict, 86
provide guidance for social pol- normative developments, 113
icy, 52
normative discourse, 306
purpose of public policy, 12
normative ethics, 311
quality of life, 86
normative status
relational understanding of, 65
of beliefs, 282
relative to projects, 90
normativity, 19
require public debate, 13
norms
the rejection of philosophical
explicit linguistic expressions,
egoism, 17
362
422
INDEX
metalinguistic elements of, 357 perfect information, 341

Nozick, 79
performance-enhancing drugs, 97
personal security, 105
objective grounds of value, 272
persons
objective moral properties, 294
as embodied beings, 67
objective scientific procedures, 214
as locus of needs, 66
objectivism, 214
Peter Schotch, 343
objectivists, 272, 276
phase space, 327
objectivity, 212, 219
photo radar, 157
objectivity and universality, 214
Platonism, 298
observer, 356
Platonists, 272
obsolescence, 30
Platts, M., 257
official development assistance, 116
policy
one-off decisions, 137
for resource distribution, 79
one-step remedies, 149
policy formation
operationalizing pragmatism, 139
value of incremental approach,
oppression, 44
342
oppressive conditions
policymakers, 94
interference with autonomy, 68
political efficacy
ordinary moral discourse, 274
tests for, 128
organizational loyalties, 137
political identities, 114
otherwise deployable resources, 82
political negotiation, 94
Ottawa convention, 103
political parties, 162
ought
populations
from is, 79
vs individuals, 85
postcolonial states, 108
Partiality, 32
postmodern, 216
partiality, 33
postmodern challenge
among persons, 32
to philosophy of social science,
participation, 128, 145
209
partisanship, 151
postmodernism, 202
Pat Barker, 241
preferences, 13, 52, 69, 339
patient autonomy, 69, 71
prescriptivism, 274
peace activists, 114
preventive medicine, 85
peace support operations, 113
peremptory values, 149
low-tech, 85
423
principles of thriving, 276

Prior Grounding Requirement, 281,
287
priority of justice, 40
priority principle, 44
prisoners dilemma, 359
private charitable organizations, 122
private education, 15
private schooling
negative impact on equality, 15
private schools, 25
privatization, 26, 41
problem of global disparities, 120
problem of needs
solved by illegitimate fiat, 91
procedural justice, 92, 94, 96
professional policy analysts, 134
program
of Track, 326
progressive intellectuals, 163
projective, 233
projective empathy, 227
projects
co-feasible given resources, 95
selected by individuals, 94
protection of civilians, 113
prudential considerations, 151
psychological egoism, 222, 230
public and private, 35
public goods, 121, 146
public policy, 126, 130
democratic planning for, 147
evaluation, 13
public policy successes, 153
public safety, 113
public transport, 155

Public-Private, 34
qualitative, 213
quandaries, 335
quantitative methods, 220
Quine, 218, 283, 293
Ralph Klein, 160
ranking possible policies, 132
rational egoism, 222
rational-deductive ideal, 133
of political science, 129
rational-deductive method, 132
Rawls, 37, 48
re-imagining the self, 241
reasoned decision, 144
redesigning, 150
redesigning and supersession, 150
redistributions of resources, 81
redressing human rights violations,
121
redundancy
theory of truth, 304
redundant programming, 130
reference groups, 133
regularities, 346
Reinhard Selten, 135
relational autonomy, 75
relational interest, 237
relational persons, 67
relational understanding
of persons, autonomy, justice,
70
reliabilism, 286
reliability, 356
424
reliable prescriptive heuristics, 139

remedial orientation, 149
remedy the consequences, 150
representation of needs, 145
resource cost, 81, 90
resources, 94
responsibility to protect, 102, 108,
109
results-oriented style of evaluation,
130
rethinking human security, 122
revisionary process, 148, 151
Richmond Campbell, 272
right to intervene, 109
rights, 77
grounded in needs, 78
rights of individuals, 108
road deaths
reduction in France, 156
road offences, 156
Robert Audi, 302
Robert Brandom, 282
Rockney Jacobsen, 275
Roderick Chisholm, 302
role of ethics in public policy, 52
Rome statute, 113
root method, 133
roots of normativity, 358
Rorty, 278
rule, 308
nono component, 348
volk component, 348
wenn component, 348
and imperatives, 349
being in force, 351
INDEX
condition, 336
contents, 354
demographic scope, 334
development, 354
difficulty of defining, 326
in general, 325
rule explanations
vs explanation by natural principles, 353
rule-utilitarian, 305
rules, 344
a definition, 343
function of, 337
normative dimension, 345
not constituted by causal relations, 345
triptych representation, 348
Rwanda, 108, 109
Sadako Ogata, 118
Saddam Hussein, 111
Samuel Scheffler, 104
Sandra Harding, 212, 214
satisficing, 131, 134, 135, 138, 149
no guarantee of success, 136
Sayre-McCord, G., 259
scepticism, 280
Schechtman, 243
Schlick, 281, 289
scientific method, 195, 196, 199,
212, 214
second-order discourse, 312
Sellars, 347, 349, 354
semantic atomism, 281
semantics of action, 329
semi-autonomous agencies, 122
425
Sens capabilities approach, 119

seniors political activism, 88
sensations, 356
sentiment of humanity, 235
Serbia, 108
shared interest, 242
shared interests, 238
Braybrookes focus, 240
Sherman, 237, 244
Sherwin, S., 249
Siegfried Sassoon, 241
signals
of commitment, 359
Simon, 129
Simons bounded rationality, 144
small arms proliferation, 113
Smith, M., 251
smokescreen of humanitarianism,
122
social choice, 340
social group membership, 67
social groups, 65, 67
social inequality, 24
Social justice, 74
social justice, 75, 112
practical approach, 11
social justice activists, 114
social organizations, 117, 119
social policies
vs individual autonomy, 73
Social policy, 78
social policy, 75, 340
social preference ordering, 340
social rule, 325
social science, 327, 346
interpretive, 344, 347

philosophy of, 4
three schools, 17
social sciences
unity of, 202
unity within, 206
social welfare responsibilities, 116
Somalia, 107
Sosa, 302
Soviet Union, 103
speculative work in social indicators theory, 130
standpoint theorists, 220
state-variables, 327
Stella Gaon, 111
Stevenson, 302
Stewart Cohen, 279
stipulative definition, 316
strategic incompleteness, 138
strong objectivity, 216
strongly held principles, 341
subjectivists, 272
successful policy reforms, 153
successive limited comparisons, 133
supersession, 150
sustainable human development, 112,
118
symmetry-breaking, 93, 94, 96
synoptically rational
in decision making, 130
Taliban, 111
Tallys Corner, 211
terrorism, 103
Terry Connolly, 144
426
INDEX
the viewpoint of quality, 24

underdetermination argument, 295
Theodore Lowi, 137
United Nations Childrens Fund, 118
theory of motivation
United Nations Development ProBraybrookes naturalized, 237
gramme, 112
theory of rules, 334
United Nations Security Council,
theory of warranting judgments, 275
109
third kind of utilitarianism, 80
unity of method, 210, 220
Thomas Pogge, 112
utilitarianism, 12, 90, 138, 273, 336,
Thomas Seeley, 140
338
thriving, 272, 274, 276, 299
utility monster, 80
compelling criteria for, 276
analogous problem for needs,
societal, 305
82
Titchener, 231
value clarification, 133
Tom Vinc, 292
value-neutral, 134
Tom Vinci, 272
values leadership, 139
tradition of philanthropy, 120
virtue epistemology, 302
traditional utilitarianism, 150
von Wright, 326
traffic congestion, 16, 131, 153
traffic congestion charge
in central London, 154
traffic management, 129
transformative empathy, 227, 232
transmission principle, 312
transnational crime, 113
truth, 302, 305
deflationary accounts, 277
pragmatic use, 278
semantic role, 278
theories of, 304
truth of moral claims, 276
truth-evaluability, 274
truth-predicate, 277
truth-value candidates, 275
type-raising, 340
underdetermination, 283
Waismann, 289
Walker, 243
war on terrorism, 110
warlordism, 108
warrant principles, 312
warranting judgments, 279
warranting moral judgments, 277
Wilfrid Sellars, 19, 345
Will Kymlicka, 104
William Pace, 114
Williams, 283, 284
Williams, M., 287
Wittgenstein, 18, 277, 279, 285, 288,
298, 307
womens groups, 114
world citizenship
problem og, 104
427
world community, 118, 120, 123

world conflict, 112
World Federalist Movement-Institute
for Global Policy, 114
world poverty, 112

Susan Sherwin, Peter Schotch Engaged Philosophy Essays in Honour of David Braybrooke 2007

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Susan Sherwin, Peter Schotch Engaged Philosophy Essays in Honour of David Braybrooke 2007

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Engaged Philosophy:

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS

c University of Toronto Press Incorporated 2006

Printed on acid-free paper

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its

Part One: Practical Engagement

2 Teaching Class: Justice and Privatization in Education

3 Determining Health Care Needs After the Human Genome

5 Canadians and Global Beneficence: Human Security Revisited

Part Two: Theoretical Engagement

8 David Braybrookes Philosophy of Social Science

10 The Problem of Moral Judgement

11 Moral Claims and Epistemic Contexts

12 Braybrooke and the Formal Structure of Moral Justification

13 David Braybrooke On the Track of PPE

14 Bootstrapping Norms: From Cause to Intention

14.3 Some Worries . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Introduction: About David

The othersMoral Objectives, Rules, and the Forms of Social Change

1.1. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE PERSONAL STORY

1.1 David Braybrooke, the Personal Story

political theory. He was torn between studying psychology at Yale or

1.1. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE PERSONAL STORY

charm: buildings were depressing on the outside and graceless on the

1.1. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE PERSONAL STORY

interested in philosophy at every stage of learning. Most of his books

Relieved of the pressure to produce that defined life in an Ivy League

1.2. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE SCHOLAR

he maintained a home in Nova Scotia and has arranged to spend a few

1.2 David Braybrooke, the Scholar

clearly demonstrates the error of this thesis.

1.2. DAVID BRAYBROOKE, THE SCHOLAR

als, and their administration is largely left to the individual in question.

The Structure of the Volume: Overview of Essays

1.3. OVERVIEW OF ESSAYS

1.3. OVERVIEW OF ESSAYS

long understood that a productive intellectual life depends on living a

1.3. OVERVIEW OF ESSAYS

excerpts from an essay he published in the Dalhousie Review in 1985. It

Teaching Class: Justice and

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

Privatization and Costs

Privatization occurs when some practice or enterprise that has been

2.2. PRIVATIZATION AND COSTS

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

2.2. PRIVATIZATION AND COSTS

is a public or private one.8

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

2.3. TWO NORMATIVE CONTRASTS

sumers by getting them to believe that whatever is not new is obsolete.

2.3 Two Normative Contrasts between Public and Private

A private sphere is one in whichin some respectsa person or

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

matively to mark the sphere of individual autonomy, the private sphere

Private matters are also, in some respects, immune from generalization

2.3. TWO NORMATIVE CONTRASTS

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT

der discussion. On the other hand, partialities may be involved in the

The Public-Private Divide in the Real World

2.4. EDUCATION, EQUALITY, AND CHOICE

Education, Equality, and Choice

CHAPTER 2. NATHAN BRETT