Sociality and Responsibility

Reviews / Votes

Margaret Gilbert has been exploring what we mean and what is implied when we speak of a group acting and being responsible. In these essays she extends her analysis of 'plural subjects' to illuminate such highly important issues as how we should understand contractual agreements, collective belief, and collective guilt. Her work merits sustained attention and a wide audience. -- Virginia Held, City University of New York Margaret Gilbert's plural subject theory is the deepest and most powerful account of collectivity we have-the most important contribution to philosophical social theory in recent decades. In this collection of essays, she develops and extends her theory to such matters as scientific change, social rules, obligations from joint commitments, and collective remorse and guilt. These are indispensable contributions to the foundations of social theory and to the social foundations of ethics and politics. -- Frederick F. Schmitt, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign The book is well worth reading. The author has a superbly fine-grained grasp of material. The topics are absorbing. The approach is original. The examples are illuminating. * Mind: A Quarterly Review of Philosophy * [Sociality and Responsibility] represents the extremely important development in political and social philosophy, going way beyond anything else in the subject. -- Gilbert Harman, Department of Philosophy, Princeton University