Abstract My aim is to evaluate Michael Bratman’s account of social rules—what I shall call the Shared Policy View —by comparing it to a different view—the Normative Attitudes View . In particular, I consider the capacity of both views to address three important challenges. The first challenge is to explain the special normativity of social rules in general. The second challenge is to make room for social rules beyond purely practical rules, such as rules that make demands on how we feel, what motivates us, and how we think or deliberate. The third challenge is to explain the fact that many social rules seem to provide us with substantive reasons to comply with them. I argue that, while the Normative Attitudes View is well placed to meet the first two challenges, the Shared Policy View cannot easily do so; and that while the Shared Policy View might appear to have a clear advantage when it comes to the third challenge, this appearance does not survive closer scrutiny.
Nicholas Southwood (Tue,) studied this question.