The Other Side of Agency

Reader, Soran

Abstract

In our philosophical tradition and our wider culture, we tend to think of persons as agents. This agential conception is flattering, but in this paper I will argue that it conceals a more complex truth about what persons are. In 1. I set the issues in context. In 2. I critically explore four features commonly presented as fundamental to personhood in versions of the agential conception: action, capability, choice and independence. In 3. I argue that each of these agential features presupposes a non-agential feature: agency presupposes patiency, capability presupposes incapability, choice presupposes necessity and independence presupposes dependency. In 4. I argue that such non-agential features, as well as being implicit within the agential conception, are as apt to be constitutive of personhood as agential features, and in 5. I conclude.

Citation

Reader, S. (2007). The Other Side of Agency. Philosophy, 82(4), 579-604. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0031819107000162

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2007
• Deposit Date: May 23, 2008
• Publicly Available Date: Feb 11, 2010
• Journal: Philosophy
• Print ISSN: 0031-8191
• Electronic ISSN: 1469-817X
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 82
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 579-604
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/s0031819107000162
• Publisher URL: http://www.journals.cambridge.org/action/displayJournal?jid=PHI