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COMMITMENT AS MOTIVATION: AMARTYA SEN’S THEORY OF AGENCY AND THE EXPLANATION OF BEHAVIOUR

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 March 2014

Ann E. Cudd
Ann E. Cudd*
Affiliation:
University of Kansas, [email protected]
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Abstract

This paper presents Sen's theory of agency, focusing on the role of commitment in this theory as both problematic and potentially illuminating. His account of some commitments as goal-displacing gives rise to a dilemma given the standard philosophical theory of agency. Either commitment-motivated actions are externally motivated, in which case they are not expressions of agency, or such actions are internally motivated, in which case the commitment is not goal-displacing. I resolve this dilemma and accommodate his view of commitment as motivation by developing a broader descriptive theory of agency, which recognizes both agent goal-directed and goal-displacing commitments. I propose a type of goal-displacing commitment, which I call ‘tacit commitment’, that can be seen to fit between the horns. Tacit commitments regulate behaviour without being made conscious and explicit. This resolution suggests a means of bridging the normative/descriptive gap in social-scientific explanation.

Type
Articles
Information
Economics & Philosophy , Volume 30 , Issue 1: ‘Themes from the Work of Amartya Sen: Identity, Rationality, and Justice’ , March 2014 , pp. 35 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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