Abstract
Flores and Johnson (Ethics 93 No. 3 (1983) pp. 537, 545.) offer a solution to the problem of individual and collective responsibility which obscures the fundamental requirement for responsibility ascriptions, namely, moral agency. Close attention to matters of individual and collective agency provides a simple yet defensible criterion for establishing when an individual is and isn't responsible for the untoward consequences of a collective act.
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Paul B. Thompson is Assistant Professor of Philosophy and of Agricultural Economics at the Texas A & M University. His most important publications are: ‘Risk, Ethics and Agriculture’, Journal of Environmental Systems Vol. 13 (2), 1983–84, pp. 135–153; ‘Need and Safety: The Nuclear Power Debate’, Environmental Ethics Vol. 6 (1) Spring 1984, pp. 57–69 and ‘Risking or Being Willing: Hamlet and the DC-10’, Journal of Value Inquiry (forthcoming).
I am indebted to the National endowment for the Humanities and to Peter French, whose NEH Summer Seminar on Collective Responsibility provided the background information needed to write this paper.
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Thompson, P.B. Collective responsibility and professional roles. J Bus Ethics 5, 151–154 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00382756
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00382756