Abstract
In this chapter, I explain the conception of personal identity that communitarians seem to endorse. This explanation is useful because communitarians generally fail fully to explain their conception of personal identity, and because the conception serves as the basis for their criticisms of Rawls. This conception of identity is supposed to be problematic for Rawls in two ways: metaphysically and normatively. In order to assess and respond to these objections, we must have an account of this conception of personal identity. I explain what seems to be the most plausible communitarian conception of personal identity, Charles Taylor’s “practical-moral” conception of persons. This view is complex, but it can be summed up with the two following claims. First, the society in which we live at least partially determines various morally relevant aspects of our lives, like our conceptions of what is intrinsically valuable, and our capacity to act as autonomous moral agents. Second, the aspects of our lives that are partially determined by society are a part of our identity. Also, to a lesser extent, I draw on writings of Michael Sandel and Alasdair MacIntyre.
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Notes
- 1.
Honneth ’s (1995) conception of persons was influenced by Taylor , and, as with Taylor , by Hegel. According to Honneth , three kinds of recognition are required in order for a person to develop and maintain her identity. In short these three kinds of recognition are rooted in three kinds of relationships: interpersonal relationships of love and friendship; political and legal relationships founded on autonomy and equality; and relationships with people that are founded on shared values with members of a community. In short, as Honneth puts it “love, rights, and esteem” (Honneth 1995, p. 1). Honneth ’s view is rich and suggestive. Because Honneth ’s focus is more psychological and sociological, being concerned with the way in which the three kinds of recognition serve to create and foster persons’ identities, discussing it here would take me too far afield. My present purpose is not the conditions for developing identity, according to one account, but trying to make sense of and to disambiguate the different notions of identity and personhood at work in communitarian arguments regarding conceptions of persons as socially embedded and constituted. I thank an anonymous reviewer for suggesting the connection between this chapter and Honneth’s writing.
- 2.
Taylor (1984, p. 181) .
- 3.
Ibid., quoting Hegel (1955, p. 111) .
- 4.
Ibid., pp. 188–189.
- 5.
Ibid., p. 182.
- 6.
Ibid., p. 183.
- 7.
Taylor (1985h, p. 258) .
- 8.
Ibid.
- 9.
Taylor (1985b, p. 8) .
- 10.
Taylor (1985f, p. 187) .
- 11.
Taylor (1985b, p. 9) .
- 12.
Taylor (1985f, p. 187) .
- 13.
Ibid., p. 189 .
- 14.
Jaggar (1983, p. 40–41) .
- 15.
Taylor (1985, p. 190) .
- 16.
Ibid., p. 191.
- 17.
Taylor (1989, p. 3) .
- 18.
Taylor (1985, p. 100) .
- 19.
Ibid., p. 97.
- 20.
Ibid., p. 104.
- 21.
Ibid., p. 105.
- 22.
Ibid., pp. 110–112.
- 23.
Ibid., p. 97.
- 24.
Taylor (1985b, p. 3) .
- 25.
Taylor (1985e, p. 18) .
- 26.
Ibid., p. 22.
- 27.
Ibid., p. 23.
- 28.
Ibid., p. 24.
- 29.
Ibid., p. 25.
- 30.
Ibid.
- 31.
Ibid., p. 28.
- 32.
Taylor (1989, p. 35) .
- 33.
Taylor (1985g, p. 21–22) .
- 34.
Ibid., p. 23.
- 35.
Ibid., p. 24.
- 36.
Taylor (1985, p. 10) .
- 37.
Ibid.
- 38.
Taylor (1985, p. 234) .
- 39.
Taylor (1985, p. 270) .
- 40.
Ibid.
- 41.
Davidson (1975, p. 170) .
- 42.
Taylor (1989, p. 19) .
- 43.
Ibid., p. 27.
- 44.
Taylor (1985b, p. 3) .
- 45.
Ibid.
- 46.
Ibid., p. 5.
- 47.
Taylor (1985, p. 98) .
- 48.
Ibid., p. 98.
- 49.
Taylor (Ibid., p. 99) notes that we can attribute desires to machines, but, when we do so, it is only in a derivative sense—one that relies on the purpose for which the person designed the machine.
- 50.
Ibid.
- 51.
Ibid.
- 52.
Ibid., p. 103 .
- 53.
Ibid., p. 100.
- 54.
Ibid., p. 102.
- 55.
Taylor (1985e, p. 28) .
- 56.
Taylor (1989, p. 27) .
- 57.
Taylor (1985e, p. 34) .
- 58.
Ibid., p. 34.
- 59.
Taylor (1985, p. 54) .
- 60.
Taylor (1985e, p. 34) .
- 61.
Perry (1975, p. 15) .
- 62.
Ibid.
- 63.
Conceptions of the Lockean notion of identity are importantly different, and, of course, there could be some according to which a person’s change of religion, for example, does yield a change in identity. In this example, I simply assume for the sake of argument that religion is not essential to Lockean identity, to highlight the difference between the two notions of identity.
- 64.
The idea that having some values is required to be a person and that having particular values makes someone the person she is tracks the idea of how to understand persons’ features, values and desires in the conception of political identity I describe in Chap. 8.
- 65.
Ibid., p. 27.
- 66.
Ibid..
- 67.
Taylor (1989, p. 31) .
- 68.
Taylor (1985e, p. 35) .
- 69.
Taylor (1989, p. 31) .
- 70.
Ibid., pp. 34–5.
- 71.
Ibid., 1989, p. 28 .
- 72.
See p. 130.
- 73.
Ibid., p. 36.
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Campbell, C. (2014). Taylor’s Conception of Persons and His Theory of Personal Identity. In: Persons, Identity, and Political Theory. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-7917-4_4
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