ABSTRACT
Gratitude is the return of good for good. Generally, it is a positive emotion someone undergoes in response to another one’s attention, love, fidelity or any other kind of material or immaterial good. Either as an independent object of concern or as associated with other phenomena, gratitude is of interest for normative ethics, moral psychology and political philosophy. It also has been discussed in non-philosophical contexts, above all by anthropologists, sociologists, and more recently psychologists, in the wake of so-called positive psychology. Gratitude is an important part of common morality. It is firmly anchored in Christianity and other religious traditions like Judaism, Islam or Buddhism. Among philosophers, it is contested what its precise meaning, range and implications are. The present chapter focuses on a phenomenology of gratitude and does so by addressing the following questions: What is gratitude? What is its object? On what conditions do people feel and show gratitude? What inhibits gratitude in situations that prima facie seem to warrant it? What is the good of gratitude? How should we assess its social and moral significance?
