6 Strawsonian Compatibilism
We turn in this chapter to P.F. Strawson’s seminal 1962 essay, “Freedom and
Resentment.”^1 As with the topics discussed in the last two chapters, Strawson’s
contribution profoundly altered the philosophical landscape regarding con-
temporary work on free will and moral responsibility. One can easily identify in
“Freedom and Resentment” at least three distinct arguments for compatibilism.
While each of these arguments merits attention, what makes Strawson’s essay so
important is not captured by attending just to the arguments themselves. It is,
rather, the broader context into which these arguments fit. This context involves
a conception of moral responsibility’s nature that animates Strawson’s argu-
ments for compatibilism proper.
Crucially, Strawson was most interested in making clear the role of our moral
responsibility practices in our adult interpersonal lives. We are better positioned,
as he saw it, to understand what moral responsibility is and what the require-
ments of it are if we attend to its practical role. This applies to the freedom
requirement too. Our care for and commitment to each other as engaged partici-
pants in complex social relations with one another reveals how much our seeing
each other as morally responsible matters to us. Moreover, this is revealed by
attending to our emotional sensitivities. Affect matters, Strawson contended. In
his view, our demands and expectations that others treat us and others well, and
our responses to those who fail to do so, are expressed in our moral emotions,
some of which, such as resentment, indignation, and guilt, he understood as
reactive attitudes. Rather than think of these emotions as mere ancillary byprod-
ucts of our thinking and judging people to be morally responsible, these affective
proclivities and their manifestations are the most fundamental expressions of
these thoughts and judgments. Our understanding people as responsible agents
and our holding them responsible for what they do is in this way constituted by
these emotions and by the interpersonal social practices in which they find their
expression.
Before proceeding to a more careful, scholarly assessment of Strawson’s
overall case for compatibilism, perhaps it will be useful to invite you to engage
in a simple thought experiment to help illustrate what Strawson was getting at.
So, before proceeding, consider as vividly as you can a simple case in which you
or someone you love, perhaps a grandparent, is wronged by another, maybe