The Virtue of Loyalty

Abstract

Abstract This anthology collects ten new papers that survey the topic of loyalty as a virtue from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. Many of its chapters deal with the nature of loyalty and its connections with morality. When is loyalty morally justifiable, admirable, or permissible, and when is it regrettable or forbidden? Is loyalty a genuine moral virtue at all, and if so, what is its relation to other virtues? Can loyalty be reconciled with the more impersonal demands of justice and impartiality, or must these exist in irresolvable tension with one another? How does thinking about the nature of betrayal cast light on the concept of loyalty, and vice versa? Other chapters consider loyalty in connection with particular kinds of personal relationships, including romantic love and friendship, or ask what it means to be loyal to a country’s ideals or founding political documents. The development of beliefs about loyalty in children, and the role of exemplars of loyalty in understanding its nature and demands, are also considered. And a number of chapters, in one way or another, address the apparent existence of loyalty dilemmas, in which a person seems to be bound and pulled in different directions by conflicting loyalties.