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Constitutivism and Inescapability

Political Theory
Constructivism
Identity
Christoph Hanisch
University of Vienna
Christoph Hanisch
University of Vienna

Abstract

One of the shared features of the most prominent constitutivist accounts of normativity is the claim that the ultimate foundation of practical authority is sourced in certain tasks, features, or projects that every person inevitably possesses or inescapably has to deal with. In my project I want to discuss recent criticisms of this central element of the constitutivist strategy. Even some constitutivists, among them Matthew Silverstein, argue that it is exactly because of its inescapability that agency etc. are impotent sources of normative authorities. It is interesting that one and the same argumentative strategy appears as enormously promising with respect to answering a fundamental normative question, while at the same time the very same strategy is considered an unsuitable candidate for such an answer at all. My response is a limited defense of constitutivism.