Commitment

Conservative Accounts

Diverse theorists such as Thomas C. Schelling or Jon Elster analyze a classical paradigm case of commitment: the capacity to remain steadfast in the face of temptation. In their view, this is explained by the human capacity to causally influence the range and utility of future options, as illustrated in Odysseus's case of having himself tied to the mast of his ship so as not to be able to give in to temptation. In political theory, the role of constitutional constraints imposed on collective action is sometimes analyzed along similar lines. Commitments are seen as a special case of rational choice, as the source of the commitment is placed in the preferences of the user of the “commitment device” rather than in the exertion of a different dimension of evaluation.

Revisionist Accounts

According to revisionist authors, the kind of self-control involved in commitment requires the exercise of a special type of mental capacity or practical reason rather than the merely causal power that an agent has over his own future self. Commitment does not remove options from the menu of available [Page 122]alternatives but involves a different, noninstrumental type of evaluation according to which choices are made. In these accounts, “commitment” refers to an agent's ability or disposition to be bound—and guided in the course of her actions—by what she takes herself to have a reason to do, independently of other motivations he or she might have. While the Kantian allusions are certainly not coincidental, it is important to note that according to most revisionist accounts, an agent's commitments need not express her acceptance of universal moral or rational principles but may stem from the particular loyalties, values, or other normative bounds (or plans) that she endorses either as a matter of an autonomous act of will or as an effect of socialization. Some variants of these conceptions concentrate on the “deep,” temporally stable normative bounds that are claimed to be constitutive of an agent's personhood, authenticity, or integrity (e.g., “identity-conferring commitments”), while other accounts focus on ubiquitous kinds of commitments involved in any case of rule following or acting in accordance to a plan. Margaret Gilbert has developed an account of joint commitment that she claims to be constitutive of social facts. A joint commitment to x is created if the participant individuals implicitly or explicitly express the willingness to participate in the group's joint x-ing, and it puts the members under an obligation to perform their parts, independently of changes in their motivation. A joint commitment may not be unilaterally rescinded.

...