Between Kantianism and Consequentialism in T. H. Green's Moral Philosophy

Abstract

This essay explores the good-maximizing role of freedom and stringent moral rights in Green's theory and his assessment of utilitarianism, notably Mill's improved utilitarianism. Though critical of Benthamite utilitarianism, Green was favourably disposed to Mill's version of utilitarianism. Mill sometimes understood the good to be maximized appropriately (especially where Mill embraced the virtue of ‘self-development’). The ‘practical’ strategies recommended by Mill for maximizing good mirrored the very ‘practical’ strategies that Green's own theory recommended. Green was a ‘dispositional’ consequentialist: Green's moral theory was a consequentialism of moral self-realization or good will. Sidgwick's assessment of Green's moral theory and Green's selective debt to Kant are adduced in support. Green emerges as an example of ‘Kantian consequentialism.’