Accommodating Loyalty

Legal and extra-legal conceptions of loyalty often diverge, most notably in fiduciary law. Some consider this divergence problematic because they see loyalty duties as moral duties, or because they see loyalty as a moral virtue. This chapter raises doubts about a moralistic view of fiduciary loyalty, in part due to difficulties in legal enforcement. Rather than seek to bring the law into a closer fit with moral understandings of loyalty, this chapter will instead suggest that the law should accommodate extra-legal conceptions of loyalty – that is, it should make space for loyal individuals to take on obligations that match their understanding of what it is to be loyal