ABSTRACT
This chapter suspects that the Kohlbergian project would leave most people cold, especially when it is pointed out that most people never reach the principled stages of reasoning, that the best we can do is move development along to better forms of conventional reasoning, and that the relationship between this kind of moral reasoning and moral behavior is uncertain or modest at best. In approaching the moral domain, Kohlberg focused on qualities of reasoning that involve considerations of rules, laws, authorities, and formal obligations. Distributive justice is a domain that is concerned with fair sharing. Scholars in the structural developmental tradition are interested in gauging the organizational properties of intelligence. Prosocial reasoning is said to be another aspect of positive justice. Children's reasoning about their own spontaneous prosocial acts also seems to be similar to their reasoning when responding to hypothetical dilemmas.
