Afro-communitarianism and the category mistake charge: A reply to critics

Abstract

This article is written in the form of a philosophical response to the critics of the category mistake charge launched against classic Afro-communitarians. Traditional Afro-communitarians have argued that persons are defined with reference to the community because personhood is more about moral achievement. However, these kinds of definitions have been accused of committing a category mistake in how they identify persons. These communitarians have been charged with wrongfully ascribing issues of socio-moral considerations to matters of strict metaphysical identity. With that said, Afro-communitarians have responded that this charge is unfounded since persons can be located in both the metaphysical and the socio-moral category. For these Afro-communitarians, it is not a category mistake to define a person as a social or moral entity, simply because this is also part of their nature. As a result, traditional Afro-communitarians subscribe to a maximal rather than a minimal definition of persons that includes both metaphysical and normative aspects. To do this is not to commit a category mistake, but to provide a fuller account of personhood. After analysing these responses philosophically, I find that they have misunderstood the charge of the category mistake. In my findings, such misunderstandings render these arguments ineffective against an accurate articulation of the category mistake charge. In the end, I argue that as they stand, these responses are not only unsuccessful, but they betray the charge of a conceptual conflation.