What Am I Thinking About?
I work on normative philosophy, in the broadest possible sense of the term. My AOS:s are metaethics, philosophy of action, and normative ethics, and my AOC:s are social and political philosophy, epistemology, and the philosophy of the social sciences. But really I am interested in all kinds of issues that intersect with the content of my research, regardless of which philosophical or other scholarly fields they ordinarily are thought to belong to.
One overarching theme of my research is agency - both descriptively and prescriptively. On the side of individual agency,
I develop and defend what I call Humean constitutivism, including its implications in various philosophical domains. I
have paid particular attention to various norms for agents, including reasons, rationality, and morality. On the side of
group agency, I explore tensions and interconnections between individual and group agents. Here, I have argued against the increasingly dominant so-called realist view of group agency.
You can find my published or accepted philosophical work (in both English and Swedish) below. I avoid uploading my
WiP papers to guarantee the blindness of the peer review processes they are or will be involved in, but do not hesitate to get in touch with me if you would like to know more about my research.
Editorship
- Leffler, Olof & Moen, Lars (2025). Group Agency (special issue), Inquiry, Vol. 68, No. 3.
Journal Articles
- Leffler, Olof (forthcoming.a). "'Now What?' in Social Ontology and Metaethics", in Journal of Social Ontology. [Full details TBC.]
- Leffler, Olof (forthcoming.b). "Even Bigger-Picture Causalism", in Acta Analytica. [Full details TBC.]
- Leffler, Olof (2025). "Desire, Disagreement, and Corporate Mental States", in Inquiry, Vol. 68, No. 3, pp. 1000-1020. [Originally published Online First in 2023.]
- Leffler, Olof (2024a). "Constitutivism's Plight: Inescapability, Normativity, and Relativism", in The Philosophical Quarterly. [Published Online First in 2024, full details TBC.]
- Leffler, Olof (2024b). "Contingency, Sociality, and Moral Progress", in Journal of the American Philosophical Association, Vol. 10, No. 3, pp. 522-541. [Originally published Online First in 2023.]
- Leffler, Olof (2024c). "Rationality, Shmationality: Even Newer Shmagency Worries", in Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, Vol. 27, No. 2, pp. 371-404.
- Leffler, Olof (2024d). "Market Failures and Moral Failures: A Dilemma", in Public Affairs Quarterly, Vol. 38, No. 2, pp. 153-171.
- Leffler, Olof (2023a). "Agent-Switching, Plight Inescapability, and Corporate Agency", in Analytic Philosophy. [Published Online First in 2023, full details TBC.]
- Leffler, Olof (2023b). "Zombies Incorporated", in Theoria, Vol. 89, No. 5, pp. 640-659.
- Leffler, Olof (2023c). "A Reason to Know", in Journal of Value Inquiry, Vol. 57, No. 3, pp. 557-575. [Originally published Online First in 2021.]
- Leffler, Olof (2022). "How Simple is the Humean Theory of Motivation?", in Philosophical Explorations, Vol. 25, No. 2, pp. 125-140.
- Leffler, Olof (2019). "New Shmagency Worries", in Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy, Vol. 15, No. 2, pp. 121-145.
- Leffler, Olof (2016a). "The Foundations of Agency - and Ethics?", in Philosophia, Vol. 44, No. 2, pp. 547-563.
Book Chapters
- Leffler, Olof (2020). "Reasons Internalism, Cooperation, and Law", in Garcia-Godinez, Miguel; Mellin, Rachel & Tuomela, Raimo (eds.). Social Ontology, Normativity, and Law, Berlin, GER: de Gruyter, pp. 115-132.
- Leffler, Olof (2014). "Om rättfärdigandereflektion" ("On Justification by Reflection"), in Alarcon, Meri; Amundsen Bergström, Matilda; Kaveh, Tanja & Pettersen, Andrea Vilde (eds.). Meningens motstånd, Göteborgs universitet: Institutionen för litteratur, idéhistoria och religion, SWE: pp. 35-39.
Book Reviews
- Leffler, Olof (2018). “Recension av Social Contract Theory for a Diverse World – Beyond Tolerance (Ryan Muldoon)” (“Review of Social Contract Theory for a Diverse World – Beyond Tolerance (Ryan Muldoon)”), in Tidskrift för Politisk Filosofi, Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 46-51.
- Leffler, Olof (2016b). “Recension av From Morality to the End of Reason (Ingmar Persson)” (“Review of From Morality to the End of Reason (Ingmar Persson)”), in Filosofisk Tidskrift, Vol. 2016, No. 1, pp. 60-65.
Dissertation
- Leffler, Olof (2019). The Constitution of Constitutivism, PhD Dissertation, University of Leeds, UK.