Law and Reasons: Comments on Rodriguez-Blanco

Résumé 0

In Veronica Rodriguez-Blanco's thoughtful and important article, "Reasons in Action v Triggering Reasons: A Reply to Enoch on Reason-Giving and Legal Normativity, " she explores with great care the nature of reason-giving, in connection with challenging David Enoch's influential recent work on reason-giving and the law. While Rodriguez-Blanco's article makes an important contribution to the literature on the best understanding of reason-giving and practical reasoning, it is not clear that an approach to reasons for action reformed along the lines Rodriguez-Blanco suggests would change or clarify the ultimate question on which she focuses: the way in which legal systems in general or individual legal norms do (or do not) give citizens reasons for action. The question of whether we have a general (presumptive) moral obligation to act (or refrain from acting) as legal norms direct us depends to a significant degree on whether there are good arguments against an individualistic, case by case, approach to responding to such norms.