Responsibility and the Aims of Theory: Reflections on the
Strawsonian Legacy

Manuel Vargas

Over the past two decades, an impressive number of compatibilists have identified themselves as Strawsonians or defended and extended important parts of Strawson's theory of responsibility (e.g., Bennett, Dennett, Scanlon, Wallace, Bratman, and Fischer and Ravizza). The first part of the paper presents two objections, directed against a sizeable subset of neo-Strawsonian theories (especially Wallace and Dennett). The second part proposes to rescue neo-Strawsonian theories by recasting them as more systematically revisionist or deflationist than they are normally understood to be. If Strawsonianism is understood in this fashion, it represents a largely undiscussed, and potentially more advantageous, alternative to standard compatibilist and incompatibilist approaches to responsibility and free will.