The Varieties of Normativity: an Essay On Social Ontology

[Introduction]

For much of the first fifty years of its existence, analytic philosophy shunned discussions of normativity and ethics. Ethical statements were considered as pseudo-propositions, or as expressions of pro- or con-attitudes of minor theoretical significance.[^1] Nowadays, in contrast, there are prominent analytic philosophers who pay close attention to normative problems and important books written by such philosophers on topics in law and social justice and on social and institutional ontology. Here we focus our attention on the work of Searle, at the same time drawing out an important connection between Searle’s work and that of two other seminal figures in this development: H. L. A. Hart, John Rawls.

Hart was, within the context of recent analytic philosophy, the most important philosopher of law and Rawls was the most important political philosopher. Still a child of the twentieth century, as we shall see, Searle tends to assume that there is but one type of normativity within the realm of social institutions. Like Hart and Rawls, he thereby neglects features which are of crucial significance for an adequate understanding of social reality.[^2] Our main goals are twofold. On the one hand we wish to expose how this neglect constitutes a shortcoming of Searle’s ontology of social reality.[^3] On the other hand, our attention to the ways in which this neglect plays out in the normative philosophy of other luminaries of twentieth century analytic philosophy should help us to identify an entrenched trend, and also thereby contribute also to its reversal.