Joint-Carving in Deontic Tort

Abstract

This chapter argues that non-instrumental, deontic approaches to tort law—like Corrective Justice or Civil Recourse Theory—presuppose an unspecified and undefended non-naturalist account of the normativity of civil wrongs. Linking this puzzle to current debate within metaphysics, the chapter argues that a deontic theory of tort must be a theory of legal grounding—that is, an account of the relationship between torts and the facts that underwrite them. It specifies a model of the logical form of this grounding relationship and then examines whether it is a metaphysical or, instead, a sui generis legal relationship. The chapter then turns squarely to Corrective Justice and Civil Recourse Theory to determine whether they can make good on their metaphysical presuppositions.