Cambridge Journals Online

SOME TENSIONS BETWEEN AUTONOMY AND SELF-GOVERNANCE

The notions of autonomy and self-governance each capture something crucial about the moral dimensions of agents and actions. These notions are central to the ways in which we conceptualize ourselves and others. The concept of autonomy is especially crucial to understanding the distinct status of moral agents. For its part, self-governance has a significant relation to the evaluation of agents as individuals with particular characters, leading particular sorts of lives, and performing particular actions. Neither notion—autonomy nor self-governance—fully assimilates or dominates the other. Moreover, there are some important strains between them. There are certain forms of regard that the autonomy of an agent demands that are at odds with what an agent's exercise of self-governance merits. In this essay I plan to show this, and offer a diagnosis of why this is the case.