ABSTRACT
Trust Within Reason should be read as a work of political philosophy. It is, of course, many other things besides. It is an exercise in the philosophy of the social sciences concerned to explore the theory of choice and action and the relevance of that theory for our understanding of social organisation. It is a playful piece of problem posing for those who think that the instrumental conception of rationality is the only view worthy of the name of reason. It combines whimsical story telling with sharp observation of how institutions work. And it is an engaging rehearsal of some of the principal moves made in Enlightenment thought seeking to reconcile the tension that Sidgwick (1931:165-70) identified as the chief problem of modern ethics, namely how to make morality reasonable once the classical assumption that it was ultimately to an agent’s good to be virtuous had been undermined by Hobbes.
