Chapter 7 - A Hybrid Defense of the Legislative Perspective

Summary

The best option for defending the use of the legislative perspective is a hybrid approach that includes both consequentialist and nonconsequentialist commitments. Given that the theory in its original theistic form combined nonconsequentialist religious commitments with weak consequentialist reasoning, a successful adaptation of the legislative perspective to appeal to contemporary secular audiences will need to address both types of moral commitments. The type of legislative perspective under consideration is one that is moderate in its strength, realistic, at least weakly consequentialist, and applies to counterfactual cases where one is not literally legislating. The six moral commitments that one must endorse in order to use the legislative perspective in the specified sense are plausible, but they require a hybrid approach that is neither solely consequentialist nor exclusively nonconsequentialist. The nonconsequentialist reasons that justify the shift to the legislative perspective are stronger in cases where people are making decisions in political contexts, even if those contexts are not legislative contexts.