What We Owe to Each Other by T.M. Scanlon

Context

What We Owe to Each Other (1998) is Thomas M. Scanlon's major statement of contractualism, the moral theory in the social-contract tradition of Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, and Kant that was revived in the twentieth century by John Rawls. Scanlon was Rawls's colleague at Harvard, and the book grew out of his influential essay "Contractualism and Utilitarianism" (1982). The book's ambition is to answer two questions: what is the subject matter of the "morality of right and wrong" — the part of ethics concerned with what we owe to each other — and why should we care about it? Scanlon's answer to the first is that an act is wrong just in case it would be disallowed by any principle for the general regulation of behavior that no one could reasonably reject. His answer to the second is that we have a reason to live with others on terms they could not reasonably reject — the "value of mutual justifiability," the desire to be able to justify our conduct to others. The book is one of the most important works of moral philosophy of the last quarter-century, and it made contractualism a live alternative to both utilitarianism and Kantianism.

Core Arguments

The core argument is that right and wrong are not about the maximization of good consequences, nor about the deliverances of rational agency considered abstractly, but about justifiability to others: an act is wrong if it violates a principle that no one could reasonably reject for the general regulation of behavior. This "reasonable rejection" test differs from Rawls's original position and from Kant's categorical imperative in that it works from the standpoint of actual people with their actual interests and reasons, asking what principles they could not reasonably reject rather than what they would choose behind a veil of ignorance. Against consequentialism, Scanlon argues that the priority of right over good means that we may not sacrifice some people for a greater aggregate good; against skepticism about moral motivation, he argues that the desire to justify ourselves to others is a powerful, non-self-interested reason to act morally. The book also defends a "buck-passing" account of value — to value something is to have reasons to respond to it in certain ways, not to detect a mysterious property — and applies this to the value of human life, which he treats as the ground of the most fundamental moral principle. The second half of the book develops a theory of responsibility: being responsible for an action in the sense presupposed by blame involves the agent's judgment-sensitivity, and Scanlon uses this to explain when agents can be blamed and what blame is.

Key Concepts

Contractualism is the view that the morality of right and wrong is constituted by principles no one could reasonably reject. Reasonable rejection is the test of moral principles, and it is what distinguishes contractualism from both utilitarianism and Kantianism. The value of mutual justifiability is the source of moral motivation: we have reason to want to be able to justify our conduct to others on terms they could not reasonably reject. The buck-passing theory of value holds that values are not independently existing properties but shorthand for clusters of reasons. The generic value of human life grounds the fundamental prohibition on killing and harming. Responsibility is analyzed in terms of the conditions under which an agent's actions reflect her judgment-sensitive attitudes, and blame is understood as a response to the meaning of an action — what it reveals about the agent's regard for others — rather than as a sanction.

Legacy & Influence

The book revived contractualism as a serious rival to utilitarianism and Kantianism and generated a vast literature on the reasonable rejection test, on the buck-passing account of value, and on Scanlon's theory of blame. Its framework has been applied across applied ethics — from the ethics of AI, where principles of fairness are understood as principles no one could reasonably reject, to global justice, medical ethics, and the ethics of punishment. The theory of responsibility and blame has reshaped the debate on moral responsibility, and the buck-passing account of value has become the standard reference point in debates about value theory. The book is now a staple of graduate and advanced undergraduate courses in ethics, and it is widely regarded as the definitive modern defense of the social-contract approach to morality.

Reading Guide

The book is demanding and rewards a strategic approach. Chapter 1 ("Reasons") sets up the framework of reasons and value that the rest of the book uses; Chapter 5 ("The Structure of Contractualism") states the theory and is the best place to begin for readers new to it. Chapters 6 and 7 develop the theory of responsibility and blame, and Chapter 8 defends the account against the objection that contractualism cannot capture all of morality. For the theory in miniature, read Scanlon's earlier essay "Contractualism and Utilitarianism" (1982). For the political extension of the contractualist idea, read Rawls's A Theory of Justice; for the leading consequentialist response, Derek Parfit's On What Matters.

Related Works

• John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (1971) — the political-contractualist ancestor
• T.M. Scanlon, "Contractualism and Utilitarianism" (1982) — the theory in miniature
• T.M. Scanlon, Moral Dimensions: Permissibility, Meaning, Blame (2008) — the sequel on permissibility and blame
• Derek Parfit, On What Matters (2011) — the leading consequentialist response
• Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785) — the Kantian source of the idea of justifiability to others