Introduction

Within the MTC, non-obligatory control (NOC) has been pushed to the side, with the focus of inquiry resting on obligatory control (OC). The most obvious reason for this is that, as opposed to OC, NOC does not resort to movement. Nonetheless, the MTC is incomplete without an account of the distribution of NOC and in this chapter we would like to present our thoughts on this issue.

But before we proceed, a disclaimer is in order. As NOC is the elsewhere case (when movement is not involved), there may be different types of NOC which in turn may be subject to different licensing conditions. The discussion below presents the beginnings of an account of NOC that we believe is quite reasonable. However, should it turn out to be partially or totally incorrect, this does not affect the essence of the preceding chapters. As mentioned above, the MTC effectively has something to say about control relations that exhibit movement diagnostics but not much about construal relations that are not derived by movement. Thus, although we think that the proposal to be discussed below fits snugly with the version of MTC advocated in this volume, the two are to some extent independent from one another. That said, let us move to the discussion proper.