Objective Reason and Respect for Persons

Abstract

Plato allied passion with reason against appetite.1 He thus accorded reason considerably greater authority than is expressed in the strategic con ception of rationality characteristic of broadly utilitarian thought. Within this narrower, instrumentalist conception, reason devises the means to ends set by individual desire and justifies action insofar as it promotes these aims. It does not attempt to evaluate the ends. The alternative view, by contrast, tries to distinguish a class of rational ends and thereby ascribes to reason a normative rather than merely strategic function. In so doing it presupposes the existence of standards independent of individual desires by which these desires can be assessed, and in this sense it considers some reasons for action as objective rather than subjective. If such rational ends may be called needs in distinction from simple wants or interests, their objective validity creates a prima facie case for say ing that anyone's needs should be satisfied. The standards which demarcate objective from merely subjective reasons for action are unhappily difficult to identify, however, and political theories, such as socialism, which are con cerned to justify collective efforts to satisfy human needs founder in this ob scurity unless they can provide an adequate account of objective rationality. The chief criterion of adequacy is a satisfactory answer to an alternative? liberal or Kantian?account of objective rationality which includes no dis tinctive theory of needs.2 Kant's requirement of respect for persons represents a particularly clear recognition of the importance of formulating an account of objective rationality. Respect is an attitude we have toward persons we regard as our equals or superiors, and it is therefore rationally justified only if its objects are one's peers or betters. Respect for persons in general, furthermore, as signs to everyone equal human worth, and lack of such respect indicates failure to recognize the equal value of persons as persons. These truisms can not be expressed within a utilitarian account of reason and evaluation. The statement of equality which justifies the claim that human beings warrant respect is not a statement of strategy and therefore cannot, on utilitarian grounds, provide a reason for action. If reference to equality does provide a reason for treating persons with respect, therefore, then while utility is un questionably one important criterion of value, utilitarianism?the theory that