Agency and Needs
09/06/11 19:48 Filed in: Human Nature | social justice
"A theory of human needs constitutes the foundation of a critical theory of society the end of which is the greatest expansion of the human person in a given concrete historical situation."
I wrote that sentence as part of a book proposal which I am working on. My book concerns human nature, particularly human nature as the foundation of a just society. It will be the backbone of a natural law theory and a critical politics based on that natural law theory. Human needs provides the contours for exploring those ethical and political issues. Any "right" we might have must be based, in some part, on how it satisfies or serves some human need.
The question that arises, that's been plaguing me, is, What is the relationship between these human needs and agency? I'm asking about agency because, in contemporary culture, both evolutionary psychology and social constructivism threaten agency. They threaten agency by either denying it and embracing some form of determinism (we are determined either by our biology or by our culture) or sharply curtail it. So one need that appears clear in the modern situation is a need for a better understanding of agency so that society can be more structured to enhance agency.
Thus, my original sentence points to the link between a theory of human needs and a theory of human agency. The greatest expansion of the human person in a given concrete historical situation concerns, essentially, the expansion of the person's agency in that historical situation. The needs and the agency mutually determine each other given the biological and sociological constraints that the individual finds herself in. That is, a theory of human needs presents the conditions for the exercise of agency, which means we must understand what kind of beings human beings are: biological-cultural beings.
I wrote that sentence as part of a book proposal which I am working on. My book concerns human nature, particularly human nature as the foundation of a just society. It will be the backbone of a natural law theory and a critical politics based on that natural law theory. Human needs provides the contours for exploring those ethical and political issues. Any "right" we might have must be based, in some part, on how it satisfies or serves some human need.
The question that arises, that's been plaguing me, is, What is the relationship between these human needs and agency? I'm asking about agency because, in contemporary culture, both evolutionary psychology and social constructivism threaten agency. They threaten agency by either denying it and embracing some form of determinism (we are determined either by our biology or by our culture) or sharply curtail it. So one need that appears clear in the modern situation is a need for a better understanding of agency so that society can be more structured to enhance agency.
Thus, my original sentence points to the link between a theory of human needs and a theory of human agency. The greatest expansion of the human person in a given concrete historical situation concerns, essentially, the expansion of the person's agency in that historical situation. The needs and the agency mutually determine each other given the biological and sociological constraints that the individual finds herself in. That is, a theory of human needs presents the conditions for the exercise of agency, which means we must understand what kind of beings human beings are: biological-cultural beings.
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Philosophy, Morality, and Emotion
08/04/09 00:59 Filed in: Human Nature | social justice
Discusses an article which says philosophy is dead since psychologists have determined that emotion, not reason, determines how we act morally. Links this to an ill-formed understanding of the human person. Read More...