<p>Many accounts of the evolutionary origins of rule-following (or normative guidance) argue that rules and norms emerged out of the demands of cooperation in early human societies. This paper argues that this cooperation story is misguided because of the underlying telic or functional framework it relies on in explaining the emergence of normative agency. The fundamental philosophical claim here is that teleology does not entail normativity. So normative guidance does not follow from any telic/functional explanation. I consider a range of possible responses from advocates of the cooperation story, including a defence of the shared intentionality approach, and argue that they fall short. I suggest that a deontic rational structure (instead of a telic or functional one) better accounts for normative guidance. In place of cooperation, I put forward the notion of participation as a more viable alternative that captures this deontic structure. Participation is said to foreground joint commitment (in lieu of joint goals) and co-regulation (instead of cooperation or coordination) as two distinctive features structuring normative agency. I end by gesturing towards interdisciplinary work that operationally unpacks this participation view from a behavioural and comparative perspective suggesting the central role of social play as a key focal point in the evolutionary emergence of normative agency.</p>