• Prescriptive - imperative, in the form of a command
• Universal - equally binding on all moral agents
• Public - part of a social matrix, transparent to all moral agents
• Overriding - outweighing other non-moral considerations
• Practicable - within the capacity of ordinary moral agents

The 'Principle of Publicity' maintains that an adequate moral principle must take into account the 'public' or social nature of human action. Any principle of behavior which fails to address the social nature of human action fails to be adequate. It also suggests that moral principles should be transparent or known to other moral agents.