Abstract
To justify one's actions is to provide reasons, specifically, normative reasons that serve as their foundation. This process involves three key elements: facts, beliefs, and desires. However, the relationship between the latter two (often understood as motivating and epistemic reasons) and the former (the facts) remains a matter of ongoing debate. This paper examines one distinctive approach to addressing this interplay: situationism. Distinct from perspectivism, casuistry, or plain contextualism, situationism offers a framework for understanding the proper place of normative reasons. The paper offers a nuanced defense of the irreducibility thesis—the claim that the truth of normative propositions cannot be reduced to the truth of non-normative facts about the world. In doing so, it argues that each of the three elements plays an essential role in shaping normative reasons for action. Yet, when isolated or taken "on its own," any one of them can be used to justify morally reprehensible courses of action—whether by individuals or collectives. The situationist perspective, by emphasizing the structure of normative rationality, offers a way to better foresee how and where such distortions occur. Ultimately, this approach may help illuminate the wrongness of certain human endeavors, that is, to counter the potential tyranny of any of the three elements in play.
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Published in
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International Journal of Philosophy (Volume 14, Issue 2)
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DOI
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10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
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Page(s)
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67-73 |
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Creative Commons
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This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited.
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Copyright
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Copyright © The Author(s), 2026. Published by Science Publishing Group
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Keywords
Situationism, Rationality, Reasoning, Normativity, Justification
1. Introduction
There is a “no-go area”, when a situation x breaks and suffocates all factors of rationality, and only pure actions remain, unburdened by normativity (think of situations such as those many people are facing in places like Ukraine and Gaza). By contrast, there is a “go-area”, when a situation x does not reach the terrain of “the ineffable”. To justify ones’ actions is to offer reasons, fundamentally normative reasons. Three elements come to play in such endeavor: facts, beliefs (epistemic reasons) and desires (motivating reasons). The interplay between both epistemic and motivating reasons on the one hand and facts on the other is a matter of debate. In looking at the way we can convincingly address such interplay, some fundamental challenges appear, for instance, the need to critically approach the normative irreducibility thesis (NIT hereafter), which states that the truth of the non-normative (the facts of the world) is not irreducible to the truth of the normative.
There is a tendency to superpose the epistemic side in the offering of justificatory reasons for action, a type of pure-reasons-first approach (which is one corollary of NIT). This amounts to a type of “transubstantiation”, which seems a denial of normative rationality, as it will hopefully become apparent. Reification and “stagnation” follow from such extrapolation. On this same line, there is the tendency to claim that truth, the predicate of beliefs and propositions, is what matters and the right thing to do is what comes out as epistemologically sound (they would say that rationality is intrinsically normative—and again it is also a corollary of NIT). Others would claim that the key is to rely on facts to the extent that “the right thing to do” is strictly dictated by the “truth of the world” as it is.
The paper begins by delineating some basic distinctions, especially related to reasons and rationality. The second section deals with the already mentioned NIT. It recognizes the irreducibility of normative truths to “the facts of the world”, but with a particular caveat: irreducibility does not preclude connectivity and correlation between the normative and the non-normative. To get a better grasp on the proposed approach of normative rationality, the following two sections explore some recent research in ethics and experimental psychology, which have been couched in situationist terms. In advancing this view, the paper deals more directly with the reach and scope of the notion of situation, thereby marking the distance between situationism and particularism or contextualism. This is fifth section of the paper. What situation(s) tell us is more than what is captured by notions such as context (scenario) or case (casuistic or atomistic particularism). The basic claim is that there is normative power in the recognition of situations, situation, and situating. The sixth section concludes by alluding to some theoretical referents in contemporary moral and political philosophy where one can trace the features of the situationist approach. Hopefully this view may help countering the effect of what we may call the tyranny of each of the elements involved in the offering of justificatory reasons for action: facts, logos, and desires.
2. Explaining or Justifying
Here is a basic distinction: there are explanatory reasons and justificatory reasons. Explanations are reasons as to how or why this or that happened, or what lead this person or that people to follow that course of action. Justifications are reasons as to why such course of action and the actions or decisions we make are right, fair, good, just, legal, prudential. Justificatory reasons are special reasons, that is, normative reasons.
And here is a situation that makes us think more seriously about both types of reasons, especially normative reasons for action: the atrocities, the deadly incursion of Hamas in Israel on October 7th; and the ongoing horrible course of action taken by the state of Israel. There is no justification for this; it is morally deplorable. And yet, one can explain how it happened and all the facts of the matter (disputed, of course). The Secretary General of the United Nations tried to operate with this distinction while asking for a ceasefire in the conflict, but as you may have heard, it failed (his detractors took explanatory reasons as justificatory reasons full stop).
Let’s try to see the parts, the elements, that come to play when
giving reasons (justificatory reasons) for action. Take the key word
reasons and the correlative notion of
rationality. The simplest form of the question would be “what is a reason”? It is perhaps a somehow misleading formulation as it seems to be looking for a definition when what we should be looking at is a theory or a conceptual framework where the definition can reach its meaning. Still we may give it a try. Thomas Scanlon argues that a reason, in its most elemental sense, is a primitive notion. A reason should be understood as
a consideration in favor of X, where X signifies the formation of a judgment about a course of action or an action itself: "I will take the idea of a reason as primitive. Any attempt to explain what it is to be a reason for something seems to lead back to the same idea: 'a consideration that counts in favor of it'" Scanlon then adds: "A reason to Φ is simply a consideration that counts in favor of Φ-ing"
| [16] | Scanlon, T. (1998). What we Owe to Each Other. Harvard University Press. |
| [17] | Scanlon, T. (2014). Being Realistic about Reasons. Oxford University Press. |
[16, 17]
.
Here is another take on the notion of "reason", namely, "the capacity reflectively to recognize reasons generally"
| [13] | Raz, J. (2009). Engaging Reason. Oxford University Press. |
| [14] | Raz, J. (2013). From Normativity to Responsibility. Oxford University Press. |
[13, 14]
. This definition seems to lead to a very "robust" conception of rationality because it seems to call for a rather naturalistic approach within the lines of moral realism. We might need an independent argument for this matter, but for our purposes it seems more appropriate to move towards a less robust conception of rationality and a more dynamic and subtle conceptual framework, as Scanlon suggests—perhaps closer to a conception of reason as
active reasoning, to use John Broome’s expression
| [1] | Broome, J. (2013). Rationality Through Reasoning. Wiley Blackwell. |
[1]
.
How about rationality? Again, a simple take on this notion would suffice. Let’s use the term “plain rationality” when I, for example, tell someone that I will give her one hundred thousand dollars. No strings attached, nothing particular to do, no conditions at all. What do you think she should do? What would you do? I think we can agree that the rational thing to do is take the money. Or imagen I tell you to choose between one hundred thousand dollars and a million dollars. The same situation: no commitments whatsoever. What would be the rational choice? The second one, for sure. A million dollars is better than one-hundred thousand, ceteris paribus. This is “plain rationality”. Notice that there is a tendency to extrapolate this “plain” rationality and make it “superior” and “different” from the situations being addressed. That is a path we must avoid: it denies normative rationality by generating, as it were, some sort of “transubstantiation” (reasons as reification).
Here is the relevant contrast. Let’s call the rationality that is dictated by something else “normative rationality”. These are reasons for action “dictated by”, and here are some candidates: prudence, common sense (or fine-grained sense), law, the state, cultural institutions, etc. And the candidate for our conversation: morality. Actions dictated by morality. It may be the case that plain rationality is normative, but in a loose sense, that is, only in relation to beliefs (epistemic reasons), whereas morality demands a closer connection between the third element of the whole structure of normative reasons for action, namely, desires (motivating reasons) as well as a robust account of the first element: facts.
Let me draw on the work of Derek Parfit (two of his illustrations or thought experiments) to delineate the three elements at play. Imagine there is a huge rock falling on my head. What should I do? Well, if I want to keep on living, I should move aside
| [10] | Parfit, D. (1984). Reasons and Persons. Oxford University Press. |
[10]
. Or think about a burning hotel, a hotel in flames, and one person there, who thinks there is a canal close to the hotel, and if she jumps out the window, she will save her life
| [11] | Parfit, D. and Broome, J. (1997) “Reasons and Motivation”. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes, Vol. 71 (1997), pp. 99-146. |
[11]
. What does she ought to do? The answer seems straightforward. But look again at the three elements: 1) facts, 2) beliefs (epistemic reasons), 3) Desires (motivating reasons). The hotel in flames is the fact; her belief that there is a canal, and it has water on it and that by jumping out the window she will fall into the water is her epistemic reason, and her desire to keep on living is her motivating reason
| [12] | Parfit, D. (2011). On What Matters. Oxford University Press. |
[12]
.
Philosophers tend to look at these elements in quite contested ways. They may say that 1) is the relevant feature for the justification of an action, and then proceed with the corresponding answer. For instance, some of them say that from the fact that we are predatory animals (let’s concede we are that for the argument), predatory actions follow, and, as that is part of nature, there is no place for a negative judgment on such actions. This is quite unconvincing.
Some of them would say that 2) is what really matters: by means of logical arguments or sound beliefs (be it related to facts or to moral principles for action) you can discover the right thing to do. And you must live by those dictates, the dictates of sound-rational-demonstrative principled beliefs. This is also unconvincing and widely disputed. And finally, some would say that it is the third element that commands: it is all about desires, or as philosophers used to put it, passions. The Eighteenth-Century Scottish philosopher David Hume claimed that reasons are the slaves of passions
| [5] | Hume, D. (1985). A Treatise of Human Nature. (E. C. Mossner, Ed.). Penguin Classics. |
[5]
. Hume also famously said that it is not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the world to the scratching of one’s finger. He did not say that it was rational; he said that it was not contrary to reason, which is an interesting turn that we may leave aside at this point
| [1] | Broome, J. (2013). Rationality Through Reasoning. Wiley Blackwell. |
[1]
.
Now, we may choose a fourth option: normative rationality “dictated by situations”, by “we all, in situation”. Think of this in the negative and the positive sense. The negative is a “no situation”, a sort of “no-go-area”. It is when someone (or some socio-political structure or institution) come in and kills every member of my family and destroys everything I have (this has happened and happens for instance in Ukraine and Gaza-Isael), then whatever course of action I take would be justified, but in a scary way: it is an empty space outside morality (there would be no room for almost any typification of rationality, let alone moral rationality).
But for most situations, if “we, in situation” exercise the fundamental action of offering reasons, normative reasons for action, to ourselves, in situation, that would count, as it were, as the center of gravity. This is the positive take. In other words, by situating ourselves and everyone involved in such situation (following a combination of the three elements just mentioned, or emphasizing one against the other, in situation), that is to say, by looking at the situation in the eyes, as it were, and seeing ourselves through the eyes of the situation, as it were, then we can make more progress in the way we address the normative question, which by the same token would always be situational. We in situation, so stated, opens the possibility to counter the tyranny of the three factors involved in the offering of justificatory reasons for action: a) facts, b) logos, c) desires. This is how the normative force of situations is captured; it is the normative force of situating ourselves.
3. Normative Truths
Let’s unpack situationism. For a start, it may seem that “situating ourselves” is a normative call. It is indeed a normative call, but the view that I wish to advance, the situationist approach, is basically meta-normative (a “second order reasoning that is, though, highly dependent on a first order reasoning). This means that beliefs, related to normative principles of action do not command on their own, and that desires, that is, motivating reasons, along with “fact-giving-reasons”, are required to enter the picture for there to be a strong, robust, stable justification of action.
Consider the first element of the equation, facts, and the special relation it bears with normative morality. It is useful to see it by means of a philosophical problem (not the only one) concerning the gap between the normative and the non-normative. It has many layers, but let’s subsume it in what may be called the “normative irreducibility thesis” (NIT). Here is Thomas Scanlon’s NIT: “Truth about reasons [normative] are not reducible to or identifiable with non-normative truths, such as truth about the natural world or physical objects, causes and effects”
| [17] | Scanlon, T. (2014). Being Realistic about Reasons. Oxford University Press. |
[17]
.
It is my contention that NIT is only partially sound, and that we can bridge the gap of the normative and the non-normative.
First, here is what we can take on board in NIT:
A. the normative has some rationality on its own, and:
B. the non-normative does not contain the normative.
But it turns unconvincing if understood along the following claims:
C. the normative is independent from the non-normative, and:
D. There is no correlation between the non-normative and the normative.
In including situations in the picture or in the conversation, the combination (correlation-interconnection) between the normative and the non-normative becomes apparent and quite telling. If a definition of “a situation” is required at this point, then let’s think of a situation as an instantiation of the (possibility of) combination of the normative and the non-normative. The nexus between facts and reasons is indeed contingent, but that is no sufficient reason to conclude that, in the interlocutory act of giving reasons, the nexus between justificatory (normative) and explanatory (factual) must be as contingent—or to put it more strongly, there should be a necessity relation in such rational exchange. And yet, the truth of each type of reasons (its source) is irreducible, which is what NIT is about.
Let me put it as follows. The true reason that it is raining (let’s assume) and the fact that if it rains and I walk without an umbrella in the middle of the street, I get wet, is not the same as the true reason that I ought to save a child who is in danger of being run over by a truck approaching in the distance. Some would say that truth is spoken in relation to the world and natural objects, but not in relation to actions or norms. These are the non-cognitivist (and perhaps anti-realists) in moral and political philosophy. Situationism cannot be included in such a camp, but it does not reach the realists tonality either.
The bridge that unites these two dimensions (the normative and the non-normative) is not one single rationality or truth, nor is there a causal relation in terms of the true reasons of one type and the other—as if it was the case that the truth of normative reason to save the child is caused by the non-normative reason of a truck that runs towards the child. The bridge is one that connects two differentiated dimensions with a “task at hand”: a correlation which enables consistent, stable, balanced, responsible courses of action (responsible meaning responding to reasons).
4. The Situationist Approach: Contrasting Perspectives
Some background seems relevant to better grasp the situationist approach to normative rationality I intend to defend. Two trends of thought would suffice: the theological and the psychological. The first one, which is closely related to casuistry, came to light during the sixties and seventies. The most prominent text in this line of work,
Situation Ethics, by Joseph Fletcher
| [4] | Flecther, J. (1967). Moral Responsibility: Situation Ethics at Work. SCM Press. |
[4]
, was published in 1967. In theological terms, situationist ethics holds that everything boils down to an openness to divine commands for each situation in time and space (this is also known as "theological contextualism").
On a less mysterious version called "empirical situationism," the basic claim states that the right act is morally commendable or deplorable depending on what happens at a given moment and under given material conditions—in terms of direct, everyday experiences. This latter feature of situationism aligns to some extent with the so-called act utilitarianism and perhaps, in a very particular way, with existentialism—which I leave aside for the time being.
Overall, this line of thought is characterized by assigning decisive moral weight to the given conditions from which it is judged whether an action is right or wrong. The basic idea is to maintain that each action has its own condition, and moral judgment of actions cannot be given independently of the circumstances in which the acts are performed. Or positively stated, the goodness of an action depends on the situation in which it occurs.
The approach I defend takes the above views with a grain of salt, and basically servers as a reminder of the type of concerns the idea of situations can bring about. As a normative ethics, these two situationist versions (theological and empirical ethics) are not convincing. And this is also the case for casuistry, which should not be understood as a normative theory but perhaps, at best, as an 'art' or a ‘technique’ to deal with and make functional certain types of procedures and elementary rules of practical requirement. If it were a normative theory, it would be easy prey to conventionalist, perspectivist, or relativist objections.
Let’s briefly look at the second trend of thought that also serves as a background, namely
situation ethics along the lines of
experimental psychology. The most basic concern is about the factoring of situations for moral judgment against the backdrop of a variety of interactive scenarios
| [7] | Kristjánsson, K. (2012). “Situationism and the Concept of a Situation”. European Journal of Philosophy: S1 pp. e52-e72. |
[7]
. The fundamental question is about agency and how the idea of a virtuous person is just an illusion (virtue ethics is the main target). The striking conclusion some researchers draw from various experimental studies is that situations have the final say regarding how one acts. This view stands in stark contrast to the typical position of virtue ethics, according to which the rightness or wrongness of an action is relative to the virtuous person (their dispositions or personality traits).
The right act, according to this rather Aristotelian view, is such given the virtuous character of the person. This seems dubious, not necessarily about the central objection to virtue ethics, but for the more general rejection of normative rationality. We may grant that virtue ethics so stated is debunked, but this view does not seem convincing because it negates all forms of agency, not only in relation to how we offer justificatory reasons but also in relation to plain rationality, the very action of thinking. While thinking is a form of acting (or interacting), and therefore could be prey to the limitations and determinants of interactive situations, we cannot simply collapse the action of thinking (and deliberative interaction) into the situation in which the action is carried out, let alone collapse moral judgment on actions into the pure happening, as a strict result of the situation in which they appear. This is the terrain of determinism where the possibility of agency is annulled, not to mention the annulment of the value of agency—both are conditions for speaking sensibly about the situation.
The situationist perspective in experimental social psychology has done well in showing the error of attributing virtuous acts to virtuous character and thinking of the situation as a “inert” stage for action. But this speaks to dispositions for action (and perhaps the basic advice that could be put in Socratic terms, is 'know yourself in the situation', which goes beyond the simple Socratic saying 'know yourself'), not to the support of moral rationality. That child should not be thrown out with the bathwater of Aristotelian-focused folk psychology. The right act is also the object of normative rationality, and this is differentiable from situations at the very moment its situated nature is recognized. Thus, it is sufficient to appeal to the elemental trait of rationality (as a capacity or as an epistemological compass) to give fixity to moral norms (and support to moral judgments) and include in that fixity the influence of the situation.
5. Situation, Situations, Situating
A simple question arises: what is a situation? Perhaps a better question would address the use of the word, and that is how I intend to reply, by alluding to
four of them. But still we can provide a straightforward response to this simple question as if a situation was a thing, with specific features. A situation has the following features: it is a) actual, b) conflictual, c) resolution-driven, d) relational, e) normatively active. This makes situationism different from particularism by virtue of those specific features, especially b)—although there are arguably some psychological similitudes between the two philosophical positions. And it also differs from contextualism mainly in view of d). There is also a feature that stems from the situationist perspective rather than from situations in this general sense, which I call “the vindicatory drive”
| [20] | Solís Umaña, M. (2019). “Latin America: Inequality Provoking Critical Thought”. Drydyk, J. & Keleher, J. (eds.): Routledge Handbook of Development Ethics. Routledge, pp. 369-375. |
[20]
, drawing on Bernard Williams’s capture of the sense of “reparation” that comes with the word vindicatory as opposed to vindictive
| [22] | Williams, B. (2006). Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline. Princeton University Press. |
[22]
. I will leave aside this feature of situationism for now.
Consider thus four uses of the word “situation” that further state the situationist approach I wish to advance. The first one is situation as a mass noun (which is quite cryptic and is best understood by contrast to situation as a count noun). We say, ‘I have
a situation’ or ‘in
this or
that situation’, which we can enumerate. But we can also use the word situation in a way that its referent is not any specific situation. It is analogous to the use of the word reason in a sentence such as ‘there is reason to belief that x’, which differs from ‘I have one reason to belief that x’
| [1] | Broome, J. (2013). Rationality Through Reasoning. Wiley Blackwell. |
[1]
. When I say, 'I have reason to do X,' the word
reason refers to a rational framework. Now, if that rational framework is assumed to be unique, then we allude to the object
Reason, with a capital R (which is equivalent to saying 'The Reason'). But we can avoid such idea of Reason with capital R and still express the idea of “a rationale”, which is a logical basis for a course of action.
Situation as a mass noun refers to a
factor that one can take into consideration when trying to build a theoretical model in social sciences. Take Economics and a quite relevant criticism of its theoretical practices. Most models so far have not included
nature (air, ecosystems, the biosphere) as part of the whole calculus. They take nature as “something given” and fail to see not only that nature should be part of the equation, but even more importantly, that nature has its own syntax. As Dasgupta put it
| [2] | Dasgupta, P. (2021) The Dasgupta Review: An independent Review on the Economics of Biodiversity. Ministry of Economy and Finance of the United Kingdom. |
[2]
, we need to incorporate the syntax of nature into the grammar of Economics. Not including ‘situation’ into the formula is akin to not including nature into the standard economic theory (it is like forgetting the “wealth of nature” in looking at the “wealth of nations”—a failure easy to explain in Adam Smith’s conceptual framework, but much harder to understand in the 21
st Century).
Here is another way of capturing the idea. Picture situation, as it were, as a browser window which allows navigation and opens certain content or information and restricts content and information in its own domain. The domain of situation, as it were, is on a par with the domain of reason—structures that allow and restrain actions and the justification for action. We can draw an analogy about the function of situation within a theory (or a theoretical practice, or a narrative) within a particular field—which by the way connects the normative and the non-normative. I refer to Human Rights and the function of Human Rights: they are meant to protect everyone (and nature, hopefully), from the coercive power of their constitutive and constituted institutions (more specifically the State).
Human Rights are also meant to enact and justify those institutions in their intervention (outside their “constituencies”) for the protection of those rights for every human being (and nature, hopefully). This analogy makes a stance on the conception of human rights, namely, a discursive practice that is valued and judged in relation to the realization of the specific rights in question. Along this line there is a general epistemological stand whereby situation is part of the theory (both normative and non-normative theory) telling us what “there is” and what we ought to do.
The second use of the word situation is the already mentioned contrasting use of the term as a count noun (which would be an instantiation rather than an instance). This is clearly more straightforward. We say, ‘take a look at the situation’ by which we mean ‘observe what is going on, what is happening, and align your reasons (evaluations and judgments) in accordance with those facts’. Nonetheless, there is a subtle but relevant variation of this standard view on the importance of situations when providing reasoned justifications for action.
On the standard view, the authority of the situation is strictly related to its being factual and “necessary” whereas the authority of reasons (particularly normative reasons) is the “independent” variable that dictates its norms and consequent courses of action. On the view I wish to advance, the authority of the situation is stronger and not necessarily strictly related to “the factual” (or it is, but with the caveat of its “plasticity” in relation to reason). Situations have more epistemological authority than what reasons and rationality usually recognize; they are not completely dependent variables, which makes reasons and rationality not so much the independent variables.
Here is an illustration: it is common to say that ‘we reason’ but not in the same way as when we say, ‘we digest our food’. Digesting, we usually think, is something that happens to us, whereas thinking is something we do
| [1] | Broome, J. (2013). Rationality Through Reasoning. Wiley Blackwell. |
[1]
. The alternative view is one where the thinking also “happens to us”, and “what happens” is also determined by the thinking, that is, the giving and receiving justificatory reasons for action. When dealing with reasons and actions the standard view shows a strong divide between passive and active, human agency and other types of agencies, between facts and reasons, static and dynamic. The situationist approach challenges such strong divisions and dualistic contrasts.
So therefore, in a nutshell, the relevance of the distinction between the two forms of the noun situation lies in its dialectical capacity to incorporate the normative authority of situations while constraining such authority by making situation a factor of theoretical practice, thus restraining in part actions to reasons—and invites reasoning (both explanatory and justificatory) in the same move. The very action of taking some distance from the standard view about the relation between reasons and situations further informs such dialectical capacity.
The third sense or use of the term
situation relates to both its verbal and adjectival forms. The first one is
to situate, that is, situating ourselves in relation to others. A situation is enactment, and is really captured in its dynamicity, its “movement”. In this sense, the relational feature of situations come to the fore: situating presupposes recognizing and connecting to others and to the world (culture, institutions, nature), and this is relevant because the offering of justificatory reasons for action, on its own, implies recognition and, to give just one example of a more concrete action, it implies one fundamental capacity: listening—as Eva Mejier puts it:
careful listening,
deep listening,
embodied listening | [9] | Meijer, E. (2003). “Deep Listening and Democracy: Political Listening to Fellow Citizens and Other Beings”. The Philosopher: Where is Philosophy Going? Spring, V. 111, N. 1. |
[9]
. The justificatory norms for action are therefore the product of such action of situating oneself ‘in (the) situation’.
Situation also admits the adjectival form. Something can be characterized as
situational: perspective (situational perspective), irony (situational irony), and the most telling, justice: situational justice. This combination of words is quite reaching. Justice, let’s say, is
the realization of the good and the right, and it may not come as a surprise for some when being characterized as situational, which is to claim that
there is not justice outside situations | [19] | Solís Umaña, M. (2016) Justicia situacional: racionalidad, normatividad y teoría crítica latinoamericanista [Situational Justice: Rationality, Normativity and Latinoamericanist Critical Theory.] San José: Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica. |
[19]
.
As it hopefully becomes apparent,
situation is not just the
context or the identification of a
case (casuistry). Situations have normative authority (moral and epistemic, let alone factual). The situationist approach prompts some small changes in many respects, for instance, in the way we refer to
applied ethics: instead of talking about “applied ethics” (principles in action) we may be better off by talking about “implied ethics”, which does not mean that everything is permitted. It means that values of guides of action are not ideas expecting to be realized in action, but ideas produced and tested, as it were, from within the normative authority of the ‘situating’
| [19] | Solís Umaña, M. (2016) Justicia situacional: racionalidad, normatividad y teoría crítica latinoamericanista [Situational Justice: Rationality, Normativity and Latinoamericanist Critical Theory.] San José: Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica. |
[19]
. We may work out the ethics of engagement without engaging in some transcendental principled ethics.
6. Concluding Remarks
It is time to offer some conclusions and corollaries. The expression ‘reasons for action’ lays out a specific field of thought and theorizing; it is often referred to as practical philosophy and should not be confused with simplistic pragmatism. This expression also indicates, in its most basic sense, the notion of normative reason and its function, the function of practical-cum-epistemic justification. Practical philosophy is theory (or episteme) plus action and should be distinguished from theoretical philosophy. Normative reasons for action call upon the above distinctions and is best captured in the subdomain of moral and political philosophy. It is precisely within such a domain where the situationist approach finds its place. Let me finish this outline of the situationist approach to normative rationality by echoing some of the most salient moral and political contemporary philosophies.
Take John Rawls’s distinction between the rational and the reasonable and how the conception of justice he defends is thought of as political rather than metaphysical and epistemological
| [15] | Rawls, J. (2005). Political Liberalism. Columbia University Press. |
[15]
. In describing his view of
political liberalism (different from classical or philosophical liberalism), Rawls claims that such view “does not use (or deny) the concept of truth; nor does it question that concept, nor could it say that the concept of truth and its idea of the reasonable are the same. Rather, within itself, the political conception does without the concept of truth”. And then adds: “Reasonableness, not truth, is the ‘standard of correctness’”
| [15] | Rawls, J. (2005). Political Liberalism. Columbia University Press. |
[15]
. This is not the place to unpack this contested view of justice, but the point I wish to make is that his influential idea of “thin morality” as a condition for the choosing of the principles of justice, correlative to this other fundamental notion of
public reason, captures the features of the situationist approach enumerated in page 8, especially the second and fourth: relational and conflictive.
Take Amartya Sen’s approach to justice, which he calls the
comparative approach or the
realization approach
| [18] | Sen, A. (2009). The Idea of Justice. London: Penguin Books. |
[18]
. Sen’s critique of Rawls’ theory of justice is quite strong: he rejects the whole contractual structure, pejoratively called “transcendental institutionalism”. By contrast, Sen defends a non-contractual, located, scrutinized and yet open-ended, culturalist and resolutive approach to justice—all of which shed light on the reach and normative power of situations. The following quote serves as a glimpse:
“While many questions of comparative justice can be successfully resolved, and agreed upon with reasoned arguments, there may well be other comparisons in which conflicting considerations are not fully resolved. It is argued here that there can be different reasons for justice, each surviving critical scrutiny but giving rise to reasonably divergent conclusions in opposite directions. They can arise from people with diverse experiences and traditions, but they can also emanate from a given society or even of the same person”
| [18] | Sen, A. (2009). The Idea of Justice. London: Penguin Books. |
[18]
.
Similar ideas are found in other relevant works in relation to justice, such as Michael Walzer’s
Spheres of Justice | [21] | Walzer, M. (1983). Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality. Princeton University Press. |
[21]
and Alasdair Macintyre’s
Whose Justice, Which Rationality? | [8] | MacIntyre, A. (1988). Whose Justice? Which Rationality? University of Notre Dame Press. |
[8]
. And the relevance of the metaethical question about normativity and rationality that arises from the work on theories of justice just mentioned is best seen in the great work of Christine Korsgaard,
The Sources of Normativity | [6] | Korsgaard, C. (1996). The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge University Press. |
[6]
. And perhaps one of the most salient examples or referents we can allude to is the emergent work on
transitional justice. Transitional justice is the name of an extensive area of research for public policy, highly complex because it deals with issues of law, politics, and economics for societies in their transition from war and institutional chaos to peace and stability. As Pablo de Greiff suggests
| [3] | De Greiff, P. (2012). “Theorizing Transitional Justice”. Nagy, R.; Elster, J.; Williams, M. (Eds.). Transitional Justice: NOMOS LI. NYU Press. |
[3]
, this trend of thought does not constitute a distinctive theoretical approach to justice, but rather an ongoing work on the revision and enacting of in applying principles of justice to circumstances in an “imperfect world.”
As mentioned at the start, each of the three elements in play, when dealing with normative reasons for action, are part of the whole story, but each one of them, separately and even worse, extrapolated, may become the rationale for the most blatantly abhorrent courses of action. Hopefully the situationist approach to normative rationality may contribute to the task of countering the tyranny of those three elements involved in the offering of justificatory reasons for action: facts, logos, desires. Let me finish with a quite known quote and a rephrasing. Blaise Pascal wrote “The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of”. I would rephrase like this: “Situations have their reasons which constraints all rationalities”.
Abbreviations
NIT | Normative Irreducibility Thesis |
Author Contributions
Mario Solis: Conceptualization, Resources, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing
Conflicts of Interest
The author declares no conflicts of interest.
References
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Broome, J. (2013). Rationality Through Reasoning. Wiley Blackwell.
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Dasgupta, P. (2021) The Dasgupta Review: An independent Review on the Economics of Biodiversity. Ministry of Economy and Finance of the United Kingdom.
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De Greiff, P. (2012). “Theorizing Transitional Justice”. Nagy, R.; Elster, J.; Williams, M. (Eds.). Transitional Justice: NOMOS LI. NYU Press.
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Flecther, J. (1967). Moral Responsibility: Situation Ethics at Work. SCM Press.
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Hume, D. (1985). A Treatise of Human Nature. (E. C. Mossner, Ed.). Penguin Classics.
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Korsgaard, C. (1996). The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge University Press.
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Kristjánsson, K. (2012). “Situationism and the Concept of a Situation”. European Journal of Philosophy: S1 pp. e52-e72.
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MacIntyre, A. (1988). Whose Justice? Which Rationality? University of Notre Dame Press.
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Meijer, E. (2003). “Deep Listening and Democracy: Political Listening to Fellow Citizens and Other Beings”. The Philosopher: Where is Philosophy Going? Spring, V. 111, N. 1.
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Parfit, D. (1984). Reasons and Persons. Oxford University Press.
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Parfit, D. and Broome, J. (1997) “Reasons and Motivation”. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Supplementary Volumes, Vol. 71 (1997), pp. 99-146.
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Parfit, D. (2011). On What Matters. Oxford University Press.
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Raz, J. (2009). Engaging Reason. Oxford University Press.
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Raz, J. (2013). From Normativity to Responsibility. Oxford University Press.
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Rawls, J. (2005). Political Liberalism. Columbia University Press.
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Scanlon, T. (1998). What we Owe to Each Other. Harvard University Press.
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Scanlon, T. (2014). Being Realistic about Reasons. Oxford University Press.
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Sen, A. (2009). The Idea of Justice. London: Penguin Books.
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Solís Umaña, M. (2016) Justicia situacional: racionalidad, normatividad y teoría crítica latinoamericanista [Situational Justice: Rationality, Normativity and Latinoamericanist Critical Theory.] San José: Editorial de la Universidad de Costa Rica.
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Solís Umaña, M. (2019). “Latin America: Inequality Provoking Critical Thought”. Drydyk, J. & Keleher, J. (eds.): Routledge Handbook of Development Ethics. Routledge, pp. 369-375.
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Walzer, M. (1983). Spheres of Justice: A Defense of Pluralism and Equality. Princeton University Press.
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Williams, B. (2006). Philosophy as a Humanistic Discipline. Princeton University Press.
|
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Solis, M. (2026). Normative Reasons for Action: The Situationist Approach. International Journal of Philosophy, 14(2), 67-73. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
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Solis, M. Normative Reasons for Action: The Situationist Approach. Int. J. Philos. 2026, 14(2), 67-73. doi: 10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
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Solis M. Normative Reasons for Action: The Situationist Approach. Int J Philos. 2026;14(2):67-73. doi: 10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
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@article{10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11,
author = {Mario Solis},
title = {Normative Reasons for Action: The Situationist Approach},
journal = {International Journal of Philosophy},
volume = {14},
number = {2},
pages = {67-73},
doi = {10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.ijp.20261402.11},
abstract = {To justify one's actions is to provide reasons, specifically, normative reasons that serve as their foundation. This process involves three key elements: facts, beliefs, and desires. However, the relationship between the latter two (often understood as motivating and epistemic reasons) and the former (the facts) remains a matter of ongoing debate. This paper examines one distinctive approach to addressing this interplay: situationism. Distinct from perspectivism, casuistry, or plain contextualism, situationism offers a framework for understanding the proper place of normative reasons. The paper offers a nuanced defense of the irreducibility thesis—the claim that the truth of normative propositions cannot be reduced to the truth of non-normative facts about the world. In doing so, it argues that each of the three elements plays an essential role in shaping normative reasons for action. Yet, when isolated or taken "on its own," any one of them can be used to justify morally reprehensible courses of action—whether by individuals or collectives. The situationist perspective, by emphasizing the structure of normative rationality, offers a way to better foresee how and where such distortions occur. Ultimately, this approach may help illuminate the wrongness of certain human endeavors, that is, to counter the potential tyranny of any of the three elements in play.},
year = {2026}
}
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Normative Reasons for Action: The Situationist Approach
AU - Mario Solis
Y1 - 2026/04/21
PY - 2026
N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
DO - 10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
T2 - International Journal of Philosophy
JF - International Journal of Philosophy
JO - International Journal of Philosophy
SP - 67
EP - 73
PB - Science Publishing Group
SN - 2330-7455
UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.ijp.20261402.11
AB - To justify one's actions is to provide reasons, specifically, normative reasons that serve as their foundation. This process involves three key elements: facts, beliefs, and desires. However, the relationship between the latter two (often understood as motivating and epistemic reasons) and the former (the facts) remains a matter of ongoing debate. This paper examines one distinctive approach to addressing this interplay: situationism. Distinct from perspectivism, casuistry, or plain contextualism, situationism offers a framework for understanding the proper place of normative reasons. The paper offers a nuanced defense of the irreducibility thesis—the claim that the truth of normative propositions cannot be reduced to the truth of non-normative facts about the world. In doing so, it argues that each of the three elements plays an essential role in shaping normative reasons for action. Yet, when isolated or taken "on its own," any one of them can be used to justify morally reprehensible courses of action—whether by individuals or collectives. The situationist perspective, by emphasizing the structure of normative rationality, offers a way to better foresee how and where such distortions occur. Ultimately, this approach may help illuminate the wrongness of certain human endeavors, that is, to counter the potential tyranny of any of the three elements in play.
VL - 14
IS - 2
ER -
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