The Social Conditions for Autonomy

Abstract

AbstractThis paper explores the social conditions for autonomy in both Christine Korsgaard’s account of self-constitution and Kant’s ethics. It argues that despite Korsgaard’s Kantian commitments she appears to suggest that such conditions might be importantly different from those that Kant affirms. Most of the paper investigates why Kant maintains that membership in a church grounded on the moral religion of reason provides the right social setting for individual autonomy. Korsgaard, by contrast, appears to suggest that the best social scenario for constituting oneself successfully is a liberal society that welcomes the pluralism of conceptions of the good that results from the exercise of human reflective capacities. The difference between the two accounts turns on their respective approaches to pluralism. While Kant favors the unanimous acceptance of the true religion reason, Korsgaard appears to favor a broader pluralism of conceptions of the good life within the bounds set by morality.