Normativity and the Other

Abstract

The paper examines some arguments for and against the view that practical reasons are subject to a participatory condition of some kind. The distinctive constitutive element of participatory conditions is that conduct or attitudes, actual or hypothetical, of people other than those who have a reason, expressing approval or the absence of disapproval of the reason in question, are a condition for the existence of practical reasons, or of large classes of them.

Keywords: normativity, practical reasons, value of rational powers, respect for people, contractualism, T.M. Scanlon,