The explanation for why US culture has gotten more transactional that I have seen most frequently is that other people cannot be trusted in the way that they used to. I haven’t exhaustively read Kant, but I don’t remember him discussing this kind of lack of trust. How should you interact with others in a world where people cannot keep their promises or fulfill their obligations? It doesn’t seem crazy to me for someone in that in that kind of situation to view the only kind of honest relationships/exchanges as being solely about right now, and hence appearing transactional.
Kant defines marriage transactionally, and otherwise grounds most social and political institutions in terms of contracts.
The explanation for why US culture has gotten more transactional that I have seen most frequently is that other people cannot be trusted in the way that they used to. I haven’t exhaustively read Kant, but I don’t remember him discussing this kind of lack of trust. How should you interact with others in a world where people cannot keep their promises or fulfill their obligations? It doesn’t seem crazy to me for someone in that in that kind of situation to view the only kind of honest relationships/exchanges as being solely about right now, and hence appearing transactional.