ABSTRACT
In a well-known discussion of constructivism in ethics, Darwall, Gibbard, and Railton characterize the view as a form of proceduralism: Restricted or local constructivism confines itself to constructing normative truth in a limited domain, such as political justice or the morality of right and wrong. Restricted or local constructivism confines itself to constructing normative truth in a limited domain, such as political justice or the morality of right and wrong. It aims to explain how such truths can be arrived at, through procedural reasoning, from other normative principles that are taken for granted for the purposes of the construction. Unrestricted or global constructivism aims, more ambitiously, to construct all reasons and values, and indeed normative truth as such. It seeks to be at once non-skeptical but also non-realist. This chapter focuses exclusively on unrestricted constructivism, with special attention to its metaethical potential.
