ABSTRACT

Morality typically imposes considerable demands on individuals. That is, any practical account of how people should behave towards one another-whether to establish a modus vivendi to avoid a Hobbesian war-of-allagainst-all, or to promote a more inclusive Rawlsian well-ordered society-requires that individuals adhere to a set of rules, guidelines or maxims that pose some constraints on their decisions, choices and actions. The specific content of these demands obviously varies with the particular features of the moral theory in question, but even theories that are explicitly concerned with promoting agents’ self-interest readily accept the idea of moral demands as justified constraints on personal (or group) agency.1