On Searle’s notion of institutional facts: Can status function declarations create institutional facts?
Introduction
There is no doubt that John Searle has substantially contributed to social ontology. What he calls ‘The Philosophy of Society’(Searle, 2010, p.5) provides a variety of epistemic resources which are significant for analysis of how our society is constituted. Therefore, Guala (2016, p.57) asserts that ‘[f]ew philosophers have had a greater impact on social ontology than John Searle’, and Machery (2014, p. 87) claims that Searle ‘has put forward one of the most influential answers’ to the question of social facts. However, despite Searl’s high evaluation, it has been argued that his argument often involves unclarity probably because of his ‘very confusing terminology’ (Epstein, 2015, p.59).
The purpose of this essay is to explain Searle’s notion of institutional facts and evaluate it by focusing on Searle’s notion of ‘status function declarations’. He discusses institutional facts in The Construction of Social Reality and Making the Social World. While most of his conceptual apparatus explained in the former work are taken over into the latter one, he adds an account of ‘declaration’ and ‘status function declarations’ by which institutional facts are created and maintained (Searle, 2010, pp.12–3). Therefore, this essay basically focusses on the latter theory unless otherwise indicated.
This essay constitutes four parts. The first part summarises Searle’s argument about institutional facts, and the second part elucidates the notion of declarations and status function declaration. The third part examines some criticisms about Searle’s declaration and defends Searle’s claim from them by employing a conceptional distinction of declarations. The fourth part shall criticise the notion of declarations from my own point of view, and then I conclude.
1.Institutional Facts[1]
Institutional facts involve particular facts in human society such as “Theresa May is the British Prime Minister”, “this note is 20 pounds”, and “Scotland is a part of the United Kingdom”, which are different from ones in chemistry and physics. Searle explains the difference by adding to the traditional dichotomy between objective facts and subjective ones the distinction between an epistemic sense and an ontologic sense (2010, pp.17–8). The ontologic distinction seems more familiar for us. For example, pain is ontologically subjective because it exists within experiences by human (or animals) subjects. Contrary to this, mountains and rivers are ontologically objective in the sense that their existence is independent of subjective experiences. In addition to this ontologic distinction, Searle introduces an epistemic distinction. For instance, “Walter Scot was born in 1771” is epistemically objective in the sense that it is not a mere opinion. On the other hand, “Walter Scot is more interesting than Thomas Carlyle” is epistemically subjective in the sense that it means a person’s attitude or opinion. Hence, Searle’s main question of and institutional facts is ‘How can there be an epistemically objective set of statements about a reality which is ontologically subjective?’(Searle, 2010, p.18)
Searle argues that, despite an enormous variety of different modes of social phenomena, there is a ‘logical structure’(2006, p.15) which underlies the constitution of social reality and institutional facts. Besides, he maintains that such a structure is comprised of some principles. We shall delve into four concepts pertaining to the logical structure.
First, Searle claims that social facts are created by ‘collective intentionality’. Intentionality denotes not only that subjects intend something but also that ‘feature of minds by which mental states are directed at or about objects and states of affairs in the world’(Searle, 2006, p.16). Social facts exist where intentionality is shared by different subjects, and such shared intentionality is referred to as collective intentionality. For instance, money exists in the sense that ‘we believe’ that this note is money. However, collective intentionality can be applied not only to human beings but also some other animals. In other words, social facts created by collective intentionality are different from institutional facts, which are a subset of social facts and include other principles (Searle, 2006, pp.16–7).
Secondly, Searle argues that institutional facts have ‘status functions’, and human beings have the capacity to impose such functions on objects or people. functions denote a cause that serves a purpose, and humans collectively recognise that objects have functions which are performed beyond their physical functions (Searle, 2010, p.7,59). One of the examples is that we believe that Theresa May has the status function of the British Prime Minister.
Thirdly, the reason that such status functions are significant for human society is that the assignment of status functions elicits ‘deontic powers’ including rights, obligations, and permissions. Deontic powers, Searle maintains, provide us with reasons for acting that are independent of our desires. If followers, despite lacking the desire to obey their boss, obey him or her, then an obligation to obey the boss functions as a deontic power (Searle, 2010, pp. 8–9, 176).
Finally, institutional facts typically require institutions, and Searle basically considers institutions as a system of ‘constitutive rules’. Constitutive rules are the rules which do not merely regulate behaviour, rather constitute the possibility of the behaviour. For instance, the rules of chess do not just regulate how to move pieces on a board, but a game of chess itself is constituted by multiple rules. Searle argues that constitutive rules have the form ‘X count as Y in context C’, so we can say that “this note count as 20 pounds in the UK” (Searle, 2010, pp. 9–10).
2.Status Function Declarations
As we have argued so far, Searle argues that institutional facts, which are a subclass of social facts, require collective intentionality, status functions, and constitutive rules, and imply deontic powers. These key concepts describing the features of institutional facts can be found in both Searle’s two works of social ontology.
There are, however, some cases which might not fall into his account in the earlier work. Although he answers three objections,[2] the most crucial one for this essay is what he calls ‘the ad hoc cases’, where institutional facts are created without a preexisting institution or constitutive rule (Searle, 2010, pp.19–20). According to his account in his earlier book, institutional facts require other institutions or constitutive rules. However, the example of ‘boundary’ which Searle gives by himself is ostensibly incompatible with this explanation. In the ‘boundary’ case, Searle (1995, pp.39–40) imagines a tribe that comes to treat a line of stones as a boundary even after the line collapses, but this example shows that the status function of a boundary is created without prior institutions or a system of constitutive rules. Thus, he comes to need an explanation of how the first institution is created without prior institutions.
Therefore, he introduces a new concept of ‘status function declarations’. Regarding the difference and development between the two works, he comes to see that ‘though “X counts as Y in C” is one form of status function declaration, there are also other forms’ (Searle, 2010, p.19). Before the second book, although he has argued that social facts are created by speech acts or ‘representation’ by language, he did not delve into what kind of speech acts can create institutional facts. Additionally, Searle admits that not all institutional facts are created by constitutive rules (2010, p.23). Therefore, he adds an account of status function declarations and endeavours to argue that institutional facts are “created and maintained in existence by (representations that have the same logical form as) S[tatus] F[unction] declarations, including the cases that are not speech acts in the explicit form of declarations”(Searle, 2010, p.13). Thus, in order to confirm whether his argument of institutional facts is successful, we have to examine the concept of declarations.
Now we have to examine what declarations and status function declarations mean. Searle states that in declarations, people make something the case by declaring it to be the case. In other words, declarations enable us to create a reality by representing that reality as existing. For instance, a chairperson can adjourn a meeting by a declaration of adjourning the meeting.
Besides, declarations are regarded as a type of five speech acts; (1) assertives (e.g. statements, descriptions, assertions), (2) directives (e.g. orders, commands, requests), (3) commissives (e.g. promises, vows, pledges), (4) expressives (e.g. apologies, thanks, congratulations), and (5) declarations (Searle, 2010, pp.16, 69).
With respect to Searle’s claim on declarations and speech acts, there are three contentions, which will be important to our later discussion. The first is the distinction between the type of state and the content of state. Imagine the following two: “I predict that you will leave the room” and “I order you to leave the room”. While both cases have the same propositional content “you will leave the room”, they can be classified into the type of assertives and the type of directives respectively (Searle, 2010, p. 28).
The second is that the five modes of speech acts can be distinguished in terms of the ‘world-to-word direction of fit’ and ‘word-to world direction of fit’. The former speech acts purport to represent how things are in the world. For example, an assertive of “The cat is on the mat.” represents things in the world and thus has the world-to-word direction of fit. This kind of proposition can be assessed as true or false. On the other hand, the latter ‘word-to-world direction of fit’ mode of speech acts such as a directives “Leave the room.” or a commissive “I promise.” change things in the world. This word-to-world direction’s speech acts cannot be assessed as true or false. While expressives such as apologies have neither of these directions, notably, declarations have both directions of fit, which he calls the double direction of fit (Searle, 2010, pp.11-12,16,28).
Thirdly, speech acts which have the directions of fit involve ‘conditions of satisfaction’, and a propositional content indicates such conditions. For example, since beliefs can be true or false, they represent their truth conditions. Likewise, desires cannot be true or false but can be in various ways satisfied or unsatisfied by being fulfilled or not fulfilled, so desires represent their fulfilment conditions. Conditions of satisfaction indicate these conditions including truth conditions and fulfilment conditions, and such conditions are represented by propositional contents (Searle, 2010, pp.28–9).
From these arguments above, it can be argued that status function declarations mean declarations which impose status function. According to Searle, we create an institutional fact of status functions by representing them as existing as status function declarations.
Before moving to the next part, this essay provides a distinction of status function declarations, which Searle does not explicitly provide but implicitly argues. We can find such distinction from the following sentences;
With the important exception of language itself, all of institutional reality [...] is created by speech acts that have the same logical form as Declarations. Not all of them are, strictly speaking, Declarations, because sometimes we just linguistically treat or describe, or refer to, or talk about, or even think about an object in a way that creates a reality by representing that reality as created. These representations have the same double direction of fit as Declarations, but they are not strictly speaking Declarations because there is no Declarational speech act. (Searle, 2010, pp.12–3)
As we have seen, declarations can be seen from the two perspectives: declarations as paralleled with other four types of speech acts and declarations as the double direction of fit. Although both have the double direction of fit, the former explicitly has ‘the same logical form of declarations whereas the latter has ‘no declarational speech act’. For the sake of clarity, we shall call them the ‘A-type declaration(s)’ and the ‘B-type declaration(s)’ respectively and define that B-type declarations do not include A-type declarations. [3]
- Defence of Searle’s Notion of Declarations
Searle’s social ontology has been criticised from various scholars since his theory covers a wide range of subjects. This part discusses criticisms pertaining to declarations and status function declarations. Although some critics question Searle’s argument about constitutive rules (Epstein, 2015, pp.121–3; Guala, 2016, pp.57–69; Hindriks, 2011, pp.343–5; 2012, pp.104–6; 2013, pp. 379–81; Hindriks and Guala, 2015), they do not focus on the concept of status function declarations. As we discussed, Searle’s theory has changed between his two works, and constitutive rules come to count as a subset of declarations (Searle, 2010, pp.13–4). Therefore, this part focus on criticisms of declarations and status function declarations.
According to Bätge, Göcke, and Zeuch (2010), speech acts and institutional facts cannot be made without ‘extra-linguistic elements’, but Searle fails to consider it. For instance, in order to make a promise, we need not only saying “I make a promise.” but also reciprocal trust between a speaker and a listener or a belief that both will have rewords, which is an extra-linguistic element. Therefore, a speech act of status function declarations also requires extra-linguistic elements, but Searles’s declarations lack these elements (Bätge, Göcke, and Zeuch, 2010, pp.187,190-92). However, this criticism regards declarations merely as a form of speech acts, which we call A-type declarations, and does not consider B-type declarations. It can be argued that Searle considers extra-linguistic elements in his argument of B-type declarations.
Tsohatzidis (2010) points out that declarations might not necessary for the creation of institutional facts. According to Tsohatzidis’s account, Searle defines declaration as a speech act that makes something the case by representing it as being the case and argues institutional facts are created by Decralarions. However, Searl claims that institutional facts are created when a declaration is collectively accepted.[4] If declarations, in the creation of an institutional fact, need collective acceptance, then it follows that declarations per se are not necessary (Tsohatzidis, 2010). Prien, Skudlarek, Stolte (2010, pp.168-9) also question the relation between collective acceptance and declarations.
Although it seems plausible to criticise the unclarity of the connection between collective acceptance and declarations, Tsohatzidis also fails to discern the difference between A-type declarations and B-type declarations. More precisely, Tsohatzidis seems to dismiss B-type declarations, and thus he mistakenly deduces the conclusion that declarations do not create institutional facts from the premise that Searle argues that declarations have to be collectively accepted. Taking into account B-type declarations, what Tsohatzidis should conclude from its premise is not that the creation of institutional facts does not require declarations but that the relation between collective acceptance and declarations are ambiguous. [5]
Hindriks (2013) disagrees that status function declarations have a central role in creating institutional facts. He takes status function declarations as a particular speech act performed at a particular time and argues that in the case of the boundary the creation of institutional facts requires the double direction of fit instead of status function declarations (2013, pp. 381–4). This objection, however, would include a problem, because it is not plausible to take status function declarations as a particular action which is performed at a particular moment. Hindriks also takes Searle’s declarations as only A-type declarations. Therefore, Hindriks’s argument that a boundary can be created without a particular speech act would not be a criticism of Searle’s argument.
Secondly, Hindriks might misinterpret the double direction of fit. His paper explains it as follows:
When you make a promise, you are obligated to do as you promised. As this requires action, promises have the world-to-word direction of fit. However, by promising something you also create a fact, the fact of your promise and the obligation involved in it. This implies that promises also have the word-to-world direction of fit. The very making of a promise licenses the belief that a promise has been made and the person who made it is under the obligation to do as promised. (Hindriks, 2013, p. 382)
In this explanation, the word-to-world direction of fit would presume promises which have the world-to-word direction of fit. However, Searle (2010, p. 68) holds, taking an example of promising, that we ‘create a reality by representing that reality as existing’[emphasis added]. In other words, Searle thinks that in making a promise the world-to-word direction of fit is supported by the word-to-world direction of fit. Accordingly, Hindriks seems to misunderstand the concept of the double direction of fit.
We have discussed criticisms pertaining to the concept of declarations. All of these criticisms fail to consider the B-type declarations. This is partly because Searle does not clearly provide a conceptional distinction between the two types of declarations. However, He, though implicitly, draws a line between the two declarations. Hence, it would not be reasonable from these criticisms to conclude that Searle’s theory of institutional facts is wrong.
- Problems of Declarations
This part provides criticisms of Searle’s status function declarations from my own point of view and examines whether declarations can actually create institutional facts without any pre-existing institutions. As mentioned, we distinguished between A-type declarations and B-type declarations. Following this distinction, I shall firstly point out the problem of A-type declarations and then criticise both declarations through investigating the double direction of fit.
Consider A-type declarations, which have an explicit form of speech act. Searle argues that in order to make a declaration (A-type declaration), one has to possess a certain position within a convention.
[T]o declare war, adjourn the meeting, or divorce, you need something more than that: you need to be in a special position where an extra-linguistic convention gives you the power to create the corresponding institutional fact. (Searle, 2010, pp 111–2)
However, if A-type declarations require a special position within an extra-linguistic convention, and if Searle thinks that institutions include or amount to conventions, then A-type declarations cannot create a new institutional fact without a convention. In his 1979 book, he has argued that declarations need ‘an extra-linguistic institutions’(Searle, 1979, p.18). Therefore, it is reasonable to think that Searle uses institutions and conventions interchangeably.[6] Thus, it can be argued that A-type declarations cannot persuasively explain how institutional facts are created without pre-existing institutions.
Therefore, what matters is to examine B-type declaration. Namely, we need to explore whether the double direction of fit, even though not having speech acts in the explicit form of declarations, are able to create institutional facts without any prior institutions. As mentioned, Searle argues that declarations ‘create facts in the world by representing those facts as already existing’(2010, p.69).
Is this explanation compelling? Take an example of a chairperson adjourning a meeting. When he/she declares adjourning the meeting, why can the declaration represent the fact of the end of the meeting before actually adjourning the meeting? In this case, the representation of things in the world (that is, the end of the meeting) would be generated after the declaration of adjourning the meeting. Likewise, when a tribe makes a status function declaration about a line of stones, the representation of the boundary would be produced after the status function declaration. This objection might be related to Hage’s criticism;
If somebody copies the file which contains the text of this paper, his file comes to be identical to mine, and mine comes to be identical to his. However, his copy of the file comes to be identical to my copy in a more basic sense than the other way round, because his copy of the file is adapted to my copy, and not the other way round. Approximately the same holds for the double direction of fit: the words come to fit the world only because the world has been adapted to the words. (Hage, 2011, p. 39)
Namely, declarations might have the world-to-word direction instead of the double direction of fit.
Whether this objection is reasonable might depend on how we interpret ‘representation’. Searle uses ‘representation’(and ‘represent’) as follows;
Anything that has conditions of satisfaction [...] is by definition a representation of its conditions of satisfaction. (Searle, 2010, p. 30)
and
“Snow is white” [...] assertively represents the state of affairs that snow is white. (Searle, 2010, p. 111)
From these sentences, it is possible to understand that representation denotes a representation of its conditions of satisfaction which its propositional content indicates. Hence, we can understand that declarations mean a ‘representation of conditions of satisfaction’, rather a ‘representation of things in the world’. Depending on this interpretation, the problem mentioned above can be solved. Namely, in the case of a chairperson, the declaration by him/her bring about the end of the meeting (that is, things in the world) through representing the condition of satisfaction, and then the representation of things in the world is produced.
However, it is dubious whether Searle understands representation as such because he asserts declarations ‘create facts in the world by representing those facts as already existing’(2010, p.69). He often takes representation as one of things in the world. Therefore, the objection mentioned above still remains.
As far as representation includes representation of things in the world, Searle’s account of the double direction of fit would not convincing. Therefore, regarding even B-type declarations, status function declarations would not be able to provide cogent reasons that they can create institutional facts without pre-existing institutions.
Conclusion
As we have argued, Searle claims that institutional facts are created by status function declarations. In order to answer the question of how we can create an institutional fact without preceding institutions, Searle develops his theory by introducing the notion of declaration and status function declarations. According to his account, the double direction of fit can create a new institution out of nothing, and thus this theory can solve the problem in the ad hoc case. This argument can be defended from some criticisms by distinguishing declarations between the two type of declarations. However, his argument that declarations have the double direction of fit is problematic. Therefore, although status function declarations might able to strengthen existing institutional facts, it seems difficult to claim that status function declarations can create institutional facts without pre-existing institutions.
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[1] As far as I read, Searle uses ‘institutional facts’ and ‘institutional reality’ interchangeably, and thus this essay does so.
[2] The second is provided as ‘freestanding Y terms’ by Barry Smith (2003, p.19). As we discussed, status functions are assigned certain objects or people, but Smith argues that some case does not necessarily elicit physical entity or object (e.g. the creation of corporations and electronic money). The third is the case where institutional facts do not require collective acceptance (Friedman, 2006; Thomasson, 2003).
[3] Remember that Searle says institutional facts are “created and maintained in existence by (representations that have the same logical form as) S[tatus] F[unction] Declarations, including the cases that are not speech acts in the explicit form of Declarations”(Searle, 2010, p.13). We can understand that ‘representations that have the same logical form as status function declarations’ involve A-type declarations and that B-type declarations denote ones that ‘have not speech acts in the explicit form of declarations’.
[4] Searle (2010, p.85) argues ‘[a] person who can get other people to accept this declaration will succeed in creating an institutional reality that did not exist prior to that declaration.’ Tsohatzidis probably points out this sentence.
[5] Tsohatzidis gives another objection regarding status function declarations. While Searle asserts that every institutional fact is created by status function declarations, Tsohatzidis holds that one cannot spend money just by saying "I spend money", cannot go on strike just by saying "I go on strike", cannot obey a military order to attack the enemy just by saying to his/her superior "I obey your order". Tsohatzidis (2010) claims, therefore, that declarations cannot create all institutional facts. However, this objection might be also problematic because these cases would imply examples of commissives which mean ‘to commit the speaker to some course of action’(Searle, 2010, p.59). For that reason, Tsohatzidis’s argument that a speech act of saying “I spend money” cannot create institutional facts would not be an objection to Searle’s theory.
[6] If Searle regards convention as something different from institutions, then he would have to explain how conventions are created.
