Practical Rules: When We Need Them and When We Don't(Cambridge Studies in Philosophy)

Rules proliferate; some are kept with a bureaucratic stringency bordering on the absurd, while others are manipulated and ignored in ways that injure our sense of justice. Under what conditions should we make exceptions to rules, and when should they be followed despite particular circumstances? The two dominant models in the current literature on rules are the particularist account and that which sees the application of rules as normative. Taking a position that falls between these two extremes, Alan Goldman is the first to provide a systematic framework to clarify when we need to follow rules in our moral, legal, and prudential decisions, and when we ought not to do so. This book will be of great interest to advanced students and professionals working in philosophy, law, decision theory, and the social sciences.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgments; Introduction; Part I. Moral Rules: 1. Outline of the task; 2. Types of rules: dispensable and indispensable; 3. Ordinary moral consciousness; 4. Rules as second-best strategies; 5. The justification of rules: strong and weak; 6. Interpretation of weak rules; Part II. Prudential Rules: 7. Moral and prudential rules compared; 8. Second-order prudential rules: optimizing; 9. A prudential rule to be moral; Part III. Legal Rules: 10. Classification; 11. The descriptive question: Hart, Dworkin and others; 12. The descriptive question: sources of law; 13. The normative question; Part IV. Moral Reasoning without Rules: 14. The inadequacy of particularism; 15. Coherence; 16. The reasoning process reviewed; 17. Objections; Notes; References; Index.

Review :
"The book is well organized into an introduction and four chapters...The service Goldman provides is realistic conception of ethical reasoning that recognizes human limitations...Goldman has provided an impressive example the sort of analytical reasoning that goes on behind the scene...Philosophers will see this book displaying clear analyses and well argued position...Goldman has also provided a real service to clinicians concerned with ethical behavior." Metapsychology Feb 28 2002 "Goldman makes his argument in a clear and convincing manner and successfully provides us with a model for moral reasoning that takes into account the differences between decision-making in the public sphere, in which rule-following is essential, and ordinary individual decision-making, in which rule following is not helpful but in which moral guidance is, nevertheless, still available to moral agents." - Marina P. Banchetti-Robino, Florida Atlantic University