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Surprenant Chris W. , Kant and the Cultivation of Virtue London : Routledge , 2014 Pp. 148 ISBN 9780415735209 (hbk) $140.00
Book Reviews
In Kant and the Cultivation of Virtue, Chris Surprenant explores the question of how Kantian agents become virtuous in practice. Surprenant argues that the answer is dispersed among Kant's discussions of ethics, anthropology, education, political philosophy and religion. The volume aims to bring these discussions together into a unified account of the development of Kantian virtue.
Chapter 1 provides an overview of the Kantian notions that are important to the discussion at hand. Chapters 2 and 3 discuss Kant's notion of civil society and offer several distinct accounts of the connection between membership in civil society and the development of an individual's virtue. Chapter 4 considers Kant's discussion of moral education, and chapter 5 investigates the role of religion in the development of virtue. In what follows, I focus on Surprenant's conception of virtue (§1) and his arguments regarding civil society (§2).
1.
Virtue, Inclination, Moral Choice
Given the topic of the volume, the question of how to understand Kantian virtue takes on a central importance. On Surprenant's account, the acquisition of virtue is necessarily a social endeavour (p. 2). I am sympathetic with this claim: if developing virtue is a task particular to sensible, embodied agents then it seems plausible that the cooperation of others will be conducive, if not essential, to its development. But this may suggest a paradox, since autonomous willing and virtue are at bottom matters of individual willing. Much of Surprenant's discussion can be read as an investigation of how the social and individual intersect in the cultivation of virtue.
Virtue itself, Surprenant argues, requires knowledge of the moral law and the development of practical reason. Beyond this it requires a strength of will (e.g. MS, 6: 408).1Surprenant focuses especially on the duty of apathy, arguing that 'Kant understands moral apathy as not being affected by heteronomous impulses that cause one to act contrary to what the moral law demands' (p. 9). A necessary condition of virtue on Surprenant's account is thus the ability to 'resist [one's] inclination toward happiness in any and all circumstances' (p. 118).
The duty of apathy is a core...