Rom Harré as a Moral Philosopher

Abstract

I will here discuss the unique combination of empirical psychological research and normative moral philosophy found in the works of Rom Harre. I will argue that positioning theory—and its approach to rights and duties in human social life—is not yet another value neutral psychological theory, but rather rests on the idea that humans are dependent, rational animals (to use Alasdair MacIntyre’s phrase), which has a number of normative implications. It can even be argued that for positioning theory to work, one has to admit the existence of objective moral values as conditions for social life and communication as we know them (cf. the work of Anthony Holiday). Finally, I suggest that Harre’s socio-normative approach to rights and duties may need to be supplemented with insights found in the moral phenomenologies of Logstrup and Levinas, who stress the vulnerability of human beings as a ground of ethics and responsibility to the other.